CD Review: Kid Mud "Birds Will Move In"

Reactions to Kid Mud's Birds Will Move In may vary significantly according to whether each listener applies a set of new critical criteria, evaluating solely the end product, or a hermeneutics that also consider the circumstances of its production. The former yields a less satisfying experience in this case, I think, as details of the modest recording process impart an endearing character to the anthemic, simultaneously complex yet unadorned electronic rock. This apparently simple personality in turn allows Kid Mud to more subtly communicate his quietly existential, if occasionally repetitious, lyrical prophesies.

The solo project and alias of Sean Duncan, Kid Mud eschews the group format of his previous work in Fiver and American Holidays along with those bands' patronage of professional recording studios. Duncan now operates out of his home as both multi-instrumentalist and producer, with some admitted help from friends, alternating between a 4 track, Digital 8, and GarageBand. Such slightly limited resources are belied by the sheer number of instruments and synthesized interludes that tend to pile on each track by its respective end, and the glitch motif that binds the opener "You Don't Belong" works in concert with western-ly picked guitars and electronic drum effects to create volume where the sound might otherwise go flat. Duncan has said that he records the drum track first, then all of the instrumentation by section, then the vocals and finally the production accouterments and this progression is often manifest by the songs themselves.

Above it all, Duncan's lyrics abstractly delineate chanted thoughts regarding life, loneliness and death. "Test the waters to sink or swim/head first or you can't begin," he advises on "You Don't Belong," smartly developing the obvious colloquialism as an implicit reference to the act of being born (babies being delivered head first). Like the mostly-solo writings of Mark Linkus for his Sparklehorse, Duncan's subjects reference each other across tracks and sustain a generally ponderous tone that unifies them. "Flatten As You Go Up" opaquely commands listeners to "send the snakes down to the hole," an enigmatic statement that is alluded to though not explained by the third track, "1401 South Grand Street," when it mentions a second-person "you" attempting to "fill that hole." By the time "you're underground head first" on "Press It Out," the EP has established and advanced a concentrated theme, albeit occasionally vague.

The lyrics sometimes too overtly follow a "non-sequitur adjective + noun" construction, such as their description of "liquid thoughts," and the songs' propensity for relying more on pseudo-choral repetition than unique verse leads to a few of those less nuanced lines lingering longer than necessary. Also, though perhaps alternatively attributable to the encoding of the mp3 rather than the original home recording, the vocals mix can locate Duncan's voice a little too far and loud above the music. Considering Kid Mud's singular creation of Birds Will Move In, however, what he calls "just stuff" sounds pretty close to just right.

8.5/10

Sean Duncan is a recent transplant to the San Francisco Bay Area. Birds Will Move In can be purchased as an Mp3 album from Amazon.

Fall-Winter Shows in the Bay Area
11/11 8:00P, The Hotel Utah w/Tom McRae & Steve Reynolds. San Francisco
12/12 8:00P, Performer Presents Echo Curio w/TCBY and Shiloe. Los Angeles