Port O’Brien – Threadbare

Port O’Brien want you to know that they know about life with the sea. If that trait wasn’t deducible from the band’s moniker, then a showing of the band’s back catalog song titles should grant the needed proof: “Stuck On a Boat,” “Fisherman’s Son,” “Anchor” to cull a few examples together. Port O’Brien, however, are not captives of this novelty trap; they simply use it as a point of departure for the tone and mood that highlights their harmony-and-acoustic centered collection.

The nautical element is tamped down severely this time around on Threadbare, the band’s third full length, trading up indicative song titles and other explicit elements for a softer undercurrent of songwriting and mid-tempo rockers. Threadbare isn’t as powerful or as celebratory as their previous release, the excellent All We Could Do Was Sing, but it is sublimely gorgeous and utterly haunting in its best moments.

Both “My Will is Good” and “Calm Me Down” are slow infectious melodies that make the hectic rush of modern life seem like needless suffering that it truly is. “I need somebody to calm me down” singer Van Pierszalowski aches in the chorus of the six-minute plus epicenter of the album. Heavy with meditation, it threatens to drown the album in too much sorrow and gravity. Thankfully, the band are skilled enough to put their peppiest number, the fuzzy Cure-wannabe “Leap Year,” immediately after it to keep spirits high. It’s the closest the band comes to its more raucous, previous state, but the displacement is evident; Port O’Brien are forging ahead, becoming their own entity with their own blueprint.

The sleepiness of the numbers is a burden to the album at times. “Next Season” plods at a stilted downtempo and “Threadbare” shows you can’t just have some reverb and monochromatic vocal line without devolving into repetition. Both tunes inhabit the second half of the album where the weak spots lurk—a few of the 13 songs on the LP should have ended up on the cutting room floor to maintain the disposition the band aims to achieve. (The overly bouncy “Love Me Through” is a good candidate for the ax.)

Still, Threadbare is indicative of place and creates multiple crafty melodies that are impossible to hear and not be transported to bitter land(or sea)scapes through the listening experience. Port O’Brien have made a fine record that makes darker evenings seems a bit lighter and warmer days appear heavier. It’s a juxtaposition that not everyone can claim to know, much less create, but Port O’Brien have a special approach and sound that makes them contenders to be reckoned with.

Tagged as: Folk, Pop, Rock, San Francisco

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