Caught in the Carousel

Skeletons With Flesh On Them

By Alex Green

Skeletons With Flesh On Them

A thrilling confluence of The Fruit Bats, The Beautiful South and Pavement, Skeletons With Flesh On Them sound like the house band on an indie rock cruise, playing artful and careening pop against the rippling waves. Led by singer Scott Roots, every number on the Seattle outfit's debut album All The Other Animals is engaging and imaginative. "Same Moon" manages a perfect undulating pop sway; "Ten Times" is a pulsing blast of twitchy new wave and the more than slightly menacing "Take Me Down," which finds Roots confessing, "I've been peeking through your window," registers a dark suburban prowl.

Skeletons With Flesh On Them

Refreshingly, this is a band that seems to thrive on disorder; on a lets-get-lost aural attack that operates in its own spacey and blissful realm. The thirteen tracks here come across like pop songs from the moon, canting gems that are weightless and nimble. "You say I could be from outer space," Roots sings knowingly. A sentiment he follows with, "Well, where else could we be from?"

Throughout All The Other Animals, trumpets wander in and vanish, banjos burst out of nowhere and trombones arrive unannounced, making their cameos and slipping back into the rich layers of the composition. In the course of a song, Skeletons With Flesh On Them are not afraid to build something up and then break it right down, start something new only to abandon it seconds later or introduce a new idea on top of an old one and then turn them both into something you can't resist following.

Skeletons With Flesh On Them

Elsewhere, "Factory Sound" is a busking, workingman's shuffle and "Longer Chain" is as ebullient as it is ghostly, with Roots declaring, "We're not dead yet but/We're stiff with the effort." Meanwhile, the brooding lullaby "Because The Town Is Sleeping" crystallizes the curse of the suburbs: "More and more we feel the boundaries/Between ourselves, between each other."

Lively, innovative and wholly original, All The Other Animals may very well be the best debut of the year.

Dear readers, allow us to introduce you to Skeletons With Flesh On Them.

Skeletons With Flesh On Them

FULL NAME: Scott Roots

NICKNAME: Rootdown (mainly a high school thing)

HOMETOWN: Lake Mills, Wisconsin

WEBSITE: www.myspace.com/skeletonswithfleshonthem

RECORD LABEL: Independent

DESCRIBE YOUR SOUND IN ONE SENTENCE: Toe-tapping end of the world rock experiments.

PROUDEST PROFESSIONAL MOMENT: All the Other Animals CD release show at the Comet Tavern.

STRANGEST PROFESSIONAL MOMENT: Our first show ever, at a coffee shop, with the barista repeatedly telling us to turn it down.

THE SONG YOU WISH YOU'D WRITTEN: "Comfortably Numb" by Pink Floyd

FIVE MUSICIANS YOU ADMIRE: Stephen Malkmus, Jeremy Enigk, John Darnielle, Will Sheff, Isaac Brock

ALBUM YOU CAN'T STOP LISTENING TO: Receivers by Parts and Labor

DESCRIBE YOURSELF AS A KID: Skinny sports-obsessed geek with a bowl hair cut.

THREE THINGS THAT KEEP YOU UP AT NIGHT: Luckily, I am a sound sleeper.

LAST TWO BOOKS YOU'VE READ: Journey to the End of the Night by Celine and Candide by Voltaire

THINGS WE'D FIND IN THE TRUNK OF YOUR CAR: A hatchet, empty growlers from Georgetown Brewing Company, an old Zeeks Pizza jacket, golf balls.

FAVORITE MUPPET WITH A BRIEF EXPLANATION: Animal: he reminds me of Devon our drummer, although Devon is hairier.

HARDEST PART ABOUT BEING A MUSICIAN: Carrying my amp, rationing drink tickets, harassing friends to come to shows.

FAVORITE LATE NIGHT TV SHOW: Colbert.

IDEAL BREAKFAST: Cereal, OJ, and a double short Americano.

DRINK OF CHOICE: Northwest microbrews.

BEST ALBUM TO PLAY AFTER A BREAK-UP AND YOU'RE HOLDING A BOTTLE OF VODKA AND SOMETHING SHARP: Sea Change by Beck

INDULGENCE YOU REFUSE TO GIVE UP: Smoking and running.

WORDS TO LIVE BY: You can rest when you're dead.

Internet: www.myspace.com/skeletonswithfleshonthem

Skeletons With Flesh On Them

All The Other Animals is out now.