The Gobblers Knob

Dallas Texas doesn’t get near the acclaim or pub that its more trendy neighbor to the south gets in Austin.  In fact, Denton Texas seems to get more love than Dallas, thanks to the emergence of indie faves Doug Burr, St. Vincent & Midlake.  The New Frontiers are a band that will surely help people keep Dallas on their musical radar of the Lone Star State.  Their recently released full-length album, Mending, a gem that showcases the smoothest vocals you are likely to find all year, an “alt-country” vibe that still manages to fit more snug into the Indie-rock rack at your local CD shop and thoughtful writing that keeps you from sticking it on in the background of your hipster dinner party while you eat Risotto (or whatever, I just figure hipsters eat risotto for some reason).

The album opens with “Black Lungs” and sets the vocal tone with which Nathan Pettijohn will continue to carry out through the entire album. At once soaring yet somber, Pettijohn succeeds where many singers must choose one or the other sonic emotion.  This opinion is enforced after the tracks “Strangers”, “This is my Home”, ”Standing on a Line” & “Who Will Give Us Love?” are done spinning.  In “This is My Home” the topics of loneliness, and “home“ are confronted while the arrangement gives the song a dynamic that builds anticipation for the climactic chorus in which the female backing vocals prove to be as pretty as the lead.  In “Standing on a Line”, we see the “alt” collide with “indie” in a pleasing way as the lonely cry of the pedal-steel hits our gut before the first lyrics are uttered.  In “Who Will Give Us Love” the religious imagery only serves to convey a sense of sadness as Pettijohn sings that he needs to “learn to pray like Jesus“. This sentiment comes off as more a desperate plea for help than a memorized Sunday-School sing-along.  After the sparse opening lines, we are carried through the rest of the song with dramatic piano and guitar that marches along with a good dose of majesty.

All in all, Mending is quite successful in that it avoids the self-indulgent meandering of many ”Indie” albums. It also never unnecessarily dares the listener to keep up with the pretense of overwrought, abstract faux poetry that clutters many “singer-songwriter” albums that typically fit nicely onto the end of an episode of Grey’s Anatomy.  As The New Frontiers tour the country with bands like Augustana, I am sure that many people will be reminded that talent in Texas does actually exist in between UT and UNT.

Listen to The New Frontiers Myspace page.

This review and so, so much more can be found on Twangville.Com