Tom Christie isn’t wasting any time. Last year, the Hudson Valley native and New Jersey transplant released his sad-eyed, slow-burning debut, Skin Gets Hot, under bedroom-folk project Fraternal Twin. Now, a year and change later, the Quarterbacks bassist has resurfaced with a backing band—Max Restaino on drums and David Grimaldi on bass, plus a few well-known guests from the DIY world—for the follow-up to Skin Gets Hot, Homeworlding. The end result reflects what happens when a homespun act earns a cult Bandcamp following: record-label interest (in this case, Nathan Williams of Wavves’ Ghost Ramp) and a subsequent first-record reissue, tightened, more disciplined arrangements and slicker production (here, Chris Daly is at the helm), among other bigger-budget goodies.
Turns out a little extra shine looks good on Christie and Fraternal Twin, who also invites Long Beard’s Leslie Bear, Porches’ Aaron Maine, and Izzy True’s Silas Reidy into the studio, where each layer some barely-there flourish to Christie’s shy, probing vocals.
But there’s a tonal shift, too, between Fraternal Twin’s first and second output; Skin Grows Hot, for all of its obvious likeness to pared-down folk leaders Real Estate, actually plays out with the sort of minimalist, experimental nervousness made popular by a fitful band like The Microphones in the early ‘00s. On Homeworlding, the Real Estate comparisons are more apt. Despite his tendency to sound like he’s about to crawl under the nearest rock, here we have a more confident Christie, who opts to sing more in the major than the minor key, and securely leads the harmonies on the bass-led “White Wind” and the brief yet full-bodied “Deprive.”
Christie continues to ramp up the energy on the almost-forceful standout “Spinning Fan,” which winds up with rapid drum fills and fades with the same sequence as someone hitting the “on” and “off” switch on that titular cooling device. The track’s brevity plays into what’s communicated on album single “Big Dipper,” which Christie recently told the FADER was about “doubt[ing] my ability to be articulate. It can feel very defeating and silly, how we are forced to act within personal lexicon.” In that vein, so much of Homeworlding’s quiet-loud interplay could represent the singer’s ongoing experiments in elucidation. That’s to say, Christie may intend for Homeworlding to be less of a headphones record than his debut, but you still may not hear it over life’s white noise.