Hi Jon,

I hope this finds you well. If your asessment that you’ve been “touring your ass off” is anything to go by, I suspect you’re reading this mail in a dark and murky internet cafe in some remote corner of the States while waiting for the show to finally begin... Or are you back on the old continent again, charming and aggravating fans alike?

Whatever it may be, I wanted to let you know that I’ve spun “So Embarassing” again and again over the past few weeks. I’ve listened to it while walking to work along the shores of Münster’s canale, while relaxing at home and at the doctor’s. I’ve even played its Progressive-Rock-, HardCore-, Fusion-, IndiePop-, Jazz-, Salsa-, Samba-, Merengue-mashup on a crowded train in the blazing heat, with a droughty woman obsessively chasing the compartments in search for people resting their dirty soles on the upholstery. On every single occasion, it has managed to paint a smile in my face.

It’s not even that I think “So Embarassing” is a “funny” album or that it’s humour is particularly upfront. It’s more in the playful way arrangements are developping, as though they were actually trying to outsmart you, their supposed composer and master. There’s a spirited moment when the veneer of Rock drops and a Jazz band comes jumping out of the box, ready to rumble and dripping of sexual energy. Or the Heavy Metal barrages on some tracks, almost too ebullient for their own good.

This was only in the beginning, of course. As the album progressed, its more serious and intimate sides increasingly started to show. The warm brass section, the triumphantly ringing guitars, the circling and spiralling harmonic progressions embedded into these joyously jumping arrangements, it was like listening to a record about lost love and broken hearts revisited by the Instrumental section of a classic Soul band. Or like crying on a blueskied day at the most beautiful beach. The endless, hopeless, heatbreaking loop sounding out “Self-Released” is still spinning in my head as I write this.

So what if people think it’s complicated? Just tell them these pieces are not mathematical but simply defy to be pressed into formulaic schemes. So what if people thought the joke was on you, if they are really only missing out what a second listen would have revealed?

But what about that album title? There’s nothing to be embarassed about at all!

Best,

Tobias Fischer

Homepage: Capillary Action