Nap Eyes - Snapshot of a Beginner

Halifax, Nova Scotia's finest Nap Eyes have been doing their thing for a fair time now, (five years in all since their first album), and have established their own rhythm and stride over the years. Snapshot of a Beginner their fifth album, is both business as usual and pastures new at one and the same time.

Over their previous records the band have established a sound that is a bit Modern Lovers, a bit late Velvet Underground, a bit Pavement and a bit themselves and now they are starting to sound most of all like themselves and leaving the others receding in the rear view mirror as they make their way down the open American alternative backroad.

If this is a slight disappointment to the likes of me who likes things that remind him of Modern Lovers and late Velvet Underground in particular, it's probably only right for the band to fully find their own voice. They laid down a marker for this early on in 2020 with Mark Zuckerberg probably the best and certainly the most concise thing they've done in their career so far. Also one of my very favourite songs of 2020.

For this is a band not known for their concision. Quite the opposite in fact. Nap Eyes have always been notable for their longeurs and digressions, lyrically and musically. Vocalist and indisputable band leader Nigel Chapman is someone who rarely gets to the point. Something of an Indie Hamlet, with one thought constantly bleeding into another. So laid back he's virtually horizontal.

That doesn't particularly change on Snapshot of a Beginner, but the songs themselves seem more considered. Most of them are languid and sparse with a couple of exceptions, the aforementioned Mark Zuckerberg which would make Evan Dando nod with approval at its pop nous and If You Were in Prison where the band truly let rip in the manner of Sonic Youth or early Ride. It comes as some surprise.

Real Thoughts the eight minute track after Prison, slows the pace again and has the most gorgeous set of guitar riffage on the whole record, mutating into something of an Indie Freebird bizarrely. A highlight. Elsewhere I'm not entirely sure of the staying power of the album and will need to revisit it again to find out.

 In some respects as I've indicated, I miss the ghosts of Jonathan Richman and Sterling Morrison that haunted previous albums. They return briefly in final track Though I Wish I Could but elsewhere Nap Eyes are truly Nap Eyes for the first time in their career. A strange criticism perhaps but they have more than enough going for them on their own terms to ensure that I will return. Certainly an album worth giving a once over if you're not familiar with this band already. For the time being, I give it eight.