Album Review: "BIG WEATHER" by 1, 2, 3

BIG WEATHER by 1, 2, 3

On Boxing Day, 2012, Nicolas Snyder, the primary songwriter for 1, 2, 3 quit the band.

In time, he returned to some sort of normalcy in his life. Living as a human being again instead of a person consumed by finishing a double album about weather, inspired by meteorological disasters.

However, in time, the itch that anyone who's played a song on stage knows all too well, came back. He listened back to the songs they had finished, that they had not finished, and that were barely written.

He then convinced them all one by one to return to the fold and the band lived and breathed once again. After listening and learning, they returned to the studio. They holed away for five months and finished this mammoth of a record...

1, 2, 3 after their shift at the Steel Mill.

To begin with, this album is huge. It's one of the biggest albums I have ever heard.

Not just in its sheer length of over seventy nine minutes and not just in its twenty tracks.

The album feels bigger than most because it immerses the listener into something different.

This disc is very unique. The songs are odd. The vocals never feel the same way twice.

There is absolute grit and absolute beauty in these songs. Much like the steel that Pittsburghers have forged for years. Like the smog coming from the factories, it's impossible to escape this album. This record feels dirty.

It feels shiny.

There's an ominpresent "analog hiss" in the recording that adds to ethereal quality to the songs. The switch between acoustic and electric guitars along with the 80's de rigueur clapping, add to a tingling that is the cure to the symptom it created.

Throughout the album there are narrative interludes that feel like they are told by a drunk or someone who's taken a knock to the head. He tries to describe the aftermath of a horrific storm.

There's just magic in this album.

Release: 5/27/14
Genre: Indie Pop
Label: American Hermitage (Purchase at this link.)
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