Woods - At Rear House

Woods
At Rear House
(2007, Shrimper Records)
7.5/10

At Rear House is one of those obscure lo-fi treasures that spice up your record collection. Woods are a duo that make simplistic acoustic/folkish music similar to Spenking or Half Handed Cloud (the vocals sound uncannily like the latter). One of the major differences Woods incorporate is some trashed drums which underscore the incredibly cheap nature in which the album must have been recorded. Back to the vocals – I am absolutely in love with them in all their eclectic, mousy beauty but the lyrics can be a bit taxing. At Rear House tends to have lyrically repetitive songs. Sometimes this works as in “Be Still” and “Night Creature” but elsewhere it just starts to create boredom. With music this simple it becomes necessary to have interesting subject matter and Woods’ infatuation with darkly tinted fairy tales never evolves into gripping narratives but plays like the repeating of chapter headings over and over. In the end Woods still succeeds in being lovely and you can’t really argue with that. Very nice.

-Mr. Thistle

Woods -Bone Tapper