Brightest Young Things

If there is one band playing DC this week that both the Fan Death and BYT (and everyone in between) can agree about than that is Dinowalrus. (I guess I really did have to go there, yes).
Anyway, the Brooklyn spaced out drum'n'drone trio plays the kind of nerdy, cerebral music that noise dorks go bananas over that still has enough structure and solid beat to it that it does not alienate those looking for actual songs, and as such, DINOWALRUS wins this weekend show battle in DC.
As I once said-you have to really know and love music in it's more traditional ways, to know how to distort it well.
They'll be around on Saturday at The Cherch, (knowingly?) hanging out with all the people they should be hanging out with in DC (True Womanhood, Laughing Man and HUME are also on the bill) and playing/thrashing their way through their "%" album, out now on Kanine Records (home also of Surfer Blood, Chairlift and the like).
The boys were kind enough to walk us through some choice tunes from it, for you Thursday weekend planning enjoyment:

CMYK

This is a 4 part epic that pretty much pushes every technical and formal ability we have to the max--there's double drumming, weird time-signature rushes, Josh drumming over a drum machine, drones, arpeggiators, key changes, intertwining vocals from Kyle and me, modal melodies. Yet it all starts with a minimalist echo-drenched three-note guitar melody, which was inspired by that Telepathe song "Sinister Militia". We wrote the song before we became friends with him, but we were stoked when we found out that our buddy Ryan from Mirror Mirror wrote that guitar part during his stint in Telepathe.

Nuke Duke 'Em

We wanted to thrash, shred and space-out in perfect proportions. Hopefully this song is emblematic of the album--a clever juxtapositon of in-your-face claustrophobia and wide open, pensive sonic spaces.

Cage those Pythons

The title is a sardonic allusion to bodybuilding. I still haven't watched that "Pumping Iron Documentary" though. This is about as garage-rocky as we get..though it probably sounds more like an 80s redux, a la Nick Cave or the Butthole Surfers than, say, the Seeds. There are some fun electronics in the background! Anyway, the double-time sections were probably inspired by the Count Five's classic "Psychotic Reaction", which has a nice double-time thrash middle bridge. Kyle wrote the main riff with the Cramps in mind. Josh's Bonham triplet drum breakdown blows my mind every time, too!

BEAD (flashback)

Since few people seem to mention this short outro track...here we go Basically we thought it would interesting to re-introduce the iconic BEAD apreggiator sequence from earlier in the album, which so many people seem to latch onto, then warp/remix it into a truly ambient outro. The segment tries to maintain an interesting interplay of
lushness and industrial dissonance. Kyle chopped up the original arpeggiator loop in the sound processing application MAX/MSP, then we collaged it back together--the end result hopefully has a Black Dice/Tangerine Dream/Cluster/Eno vibe, and winds down the album properly. This track also hints at our live take on BEAD, which
usually has a longer and more jarring intro/build up than the shorter intro we use on the album cut.

Want more:
Follow Dinowalrus on myspace///facebook///and twitter and show up at The Cherch this Saturday where they will be playing alongside True Womanhood, HUME and Laughing Man (click on those links for stories on the other 3 bands, k?)