Words by Jason Lee
When it comes to rock ’n’ roll coupledom, Alex and Tess Demir, who together form the core of Marvelle Oaks—who last Friday released an EP called Foggy City—come across as more Nancy & Lee than Sonny & Cher; more Jane & Serge than Captain & Tennille; more Jack & Meg than Avril & Chad; more Kurt & Courtney than Kurt & Courtney; more Post & Doja than um…well…you get the idea…
…or if you don’t what we mean to say is that the EP’s three songs come across as rooted in lived-in realities versus lived-out fantasies (nothing against the likes of Sonny & Cher of course) which makes Marvelle Oaks relatable in our book and makes their songs resonate (or that’s our theory anyway) and maybe it helps too that the EP was (self-reportedly) written at a time when the pair’s “heads were just coming out of the fog of the past few years in a ‘what the f*** just happened’ kinda way” which again is highly relatable cuz this decade has been pretty much wall-to-wall “what the f*** just happened” so far…
…and while Alex & Tess may drop sweet nothings like “We are indie rock. We are in love” on their Bandcamp bio, Foggy City is equal parts sweet and sour—romantic but not overly romanticized–with opening track “Took So Long” being in part about “thinking about what to say but not saying what you mean and then finally saying it when you didn’t want to” quoted from the exclusive liner notes found below kindly provided by Alex…
…set to a tune starts off a little groggy at first but wakes up as it goes along, a perfect match for the couple’s plain-spoken vocal interplay where even the guitar solo sounds like it’s sitting at the kitchen table drinking a cup of coffee, watching the “snow piling up on [the] window sill” and pontificating how “it’s funny how things worked out this way / took so long to meet you” if guitar solos were sentient, that is, and just like a good cup of Joe the sweet (“now today’s a better day”) and the bitter (“life takes a toll”) enhance each other perfectly…
…so no wonder Marvelle Oaks hover somewhere between Sebadoh (Bakesale era) and Pavement sonically on “Took So Long,” two bands that proved to the world that shambolic and transcendent aren’t mutually exclusive, Alex’s rough-hewn delivery sweetened by Tess’s call-and-response and harmonies like a modern-day indie-rock Richard & Linda Thompson circa Shoot Out The Lights tho’ with the fatalism dialed down a notch or two which is good (truly one of the great break-up albums of all time) especially seeing as the next track on the EP is a B-52’s cover, a band generally considered to be the antithesis of fatalistic…
…with the song in question being “Dirty Back Road” which is actually one of band’s rare, slightly darker, more moody numbers (tho’ “Rock Lobster” does tell of a disembodied ear and a suffocating scuba diver but we’re talkin’ vibes here) taken from the Athenian’s 1980 stone-cold classic sophomore effort Wild Planet where the song is also slotted as track two serving as something of a riposte to “Party Out Of Bounds” a song that’ll make anyone in earshot get up and do the pony or the mashed potato whereas DBR is more low-key mesmerizing which we really hadn’t thought about so much before, before we heard the version on Foggy City which only amplifies the hypnotic Krautrock vibe of the original…
…which also throwing in a pitch-bending guitar break mid-song and again towards the end providing a couple opportunities for mid-tempo head-banging if you’re so inclined (Alex cites Ricky Wilson as a major guitar inspiration, and we could also see Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy, VU’s Sterling Morrison, and Robert Quine‘s bared-wire angular playing being up there too but that’s conjecture) while still retaining the original’s seductive strut (“ride me / like a road”) and air of sublime dread (“don’t look back / don’t look behind you”)…
…fitting for a song that’s about traversing the byways ’n’ backroads of the rural South via automobile and also about other forms of backroad exploration too *ahem* at a time and place (did we mention “rural South in the ‘80s”?) when well-veiled double entendres were all but required in confronting such subjects seeing as any overt expression of queerness could be considered risky behavior indeed and fittingly Tess’s lugubrious low-end groove does much of the heavy lifting here…
…with the yipping dog heard at the track’s end returning us to the realm of domesticity leading into the EP’s final track “Diffy Q” which dials up the earworm hooks (ex: the bouncing rubber-ball guitar lead–very Ricky Wilson actually–leading up to the euphoric falsetto at 1:30 and elsewhere) to put you in that day-dreaming headspace, ditto the production flourishes too (burbling keyboards, down-pitched vocals) and if you ever wanted to hear, let’s say, Velvet Underground crossed with MGMT then you’ve come to the right place cuz that’s what we’re getting but you’ll get yr own thing no doubt that is you’re ready to let Marvelle Oaks’ Foggy City take you from earthbound to head lost in the clouds…
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FOGGY CITY LINER NOTES by ALEX DEMIR:
Out of the fog. The cover art came from a photo I took on a foggy morning walk along the East River. It just seemed relatable. Building tops poking out of a sea of grayness. Our own heads were just coming of the fog of the past few years in a what-the-f-just-happened kinda way. The 3 songs on this EP were coming into focus at the same time.
- Took So Long is from the Lost & Found department of life. As much about finding oneself as re-finding true love. Thinking about what to say but not saying what you mean and then finally saying it when you didn’t want to. We can be so flawed and so beautiful at the same time. This track also is our first of many working with drummer/producer/composer Tom Marsh (Lana Del Rey and many more)
- Dirty Back Road is a cover of one our favorite B-52’s songs. The B-52’s are so not a novelty act in our minds. Feel like they don’t get the credit they deserve. Ricky Wilson(RIP) is a guitar hero for me. We put our spin on it. Tess’ bass and the treatment of it on the recording help take the song to darker and spookier places, the guitar follows suit. All songs are like little movies to me. This one takes me down the road of yearning, letting go of oneself, lust, and the excitement of the unknown.
- Diffy Q Ever get stuck in your own head? Can’t get out of your own way sometimes? Day dreamer? This one is all about that.
Marvelle Oaks started as the moniker for the music of songwriter and guitarist Alex Demir (formerly brownbelt* singer/guitarist). Marvelle Oaks, the band, formed when Alex and wife Tess (bass/vocals) joined forces. Collaboration quickly grew from, “Hey can you play this beat …” and “just do a bass line something like this” to “Hey, we actually sound pretty good” to “Shit! we have a show. We better get our shit together” to “let’s make records”.
* Admittedly, we don’t really know if “brownbelt” is a former band or if Alex has an actual Brown Belt in the martial arts but hey sometimes it’s best not to know everything…!
