Uva Ursi
"Matter" CDR
Moonbase Records
Genres: indie
pop, indie rock
December 2005 |
Fem-fronted grungy guitar pop - you gotta love it.
Uva Ursi reminds me of The Cranberries a lot - mostly in
the guitars - but their songs don't seem to have as much direction,
instead tending to meander along a bit more. That isn't to say
Matter's six songs are necessarily bad, only that their melodies
require a bit more time to process and appreciate. Take the
country-tinged opener, "Walk Away"; twangy guitar licks lie under a
lovely vocal melody - the chorus isn't incredible, but it's satisfying
in a singer/songwriter sort of way. Grungy "Perfume," meanwhile, is
plodding with a sort of early dark Liz Phair-ish quality, while
the lengthy "Wake" is slow and unusually pretty and "Other World"
features a wonderful breakthrough chorus that reminds you how
beautiful the world sometimes manages to be. For a band named after an
herbal remedy for urinary tract infections, I'm very impressed. I
haven't tested, but I'm willing to bet music this pleasant does indeed
make it easier to pee.
78%
Matt Shimmer
[Vitals: 6 tracks, distributed by
the label, released 2003] |
