Anytime you're feeling down/Just come to me/I'll get you out of town. Those words don't just open the seventh track of this debut album by ex-Pale Young Gentlemen bassist Andy Brawner. They describe the intent of all 10 songs.
Call it dreamy folk-pop or would-be soundtrack music, but Time Since Western's sonic compositions frame imaginary places and long-lost times. The diversity of these tracks borders on disparate. Mellow folk is frequently punctuated by bursts of energetic pop.
"Bottom of the Sea" is garage-pop that, like the great songs of the Replacements, is loosely constructed and tonally uneven, on purpose. "Feathers" finds Brawner belting out soaring and hypnotic vocals that resemble TV on the Radio's Tunde Adebimpe. And "Inside Out" is the kind of cold, lonesome night ballad Rhett Miller of the Old 97's writes every now and then. The singular guitar notes are palpably chilling.
A Sun Goes Down is sure to go down as one of the best local releases of 2008.
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