Faunts – Feel.Love.Thinking.Of Album Review
Faunts, is a band out of Edmonton, Alberta. They actually have a pretty good fanbase and good critical reception. However, I’ve never heard a person mention them (I guess referring to my fellow Canadian blogger brethren) significantly. Anyway Faunts, apparently were former shoegazers turned electro artists. It almost sounds like a sell-out move, for the more popular genre. Besides, I think shoegaze is a hard genre to stay within, from a musical standout – electro gives the ability of bands to experiment further in ways they haven’t before. It’s nice to know that little fact that the band was shoegazing, I think it suits them. It isn’t a total makeover as their music is still very much ingrained but with much more wider and ambitious results.
I had zero real expectations for Faunts. I mean, I didn’t read anything about them beforehand, even when a good Pitchfork review came out (I really got to stop mentioning them)…still electro acts are hit or miss with me.
So how can explain what Faunts sound like? Well it’s really really hard to put a solid definition as they do experiment greatly when it comes to pace. Vocals aren’t necessary here but are a solid component. Fast paced, I would say they are the West Coast (yes Edmonton is hardly West Coast) answer to Holy Fuck. I actually find Faunts similar to Holy Fuck on this level thought to be fair Holy Fuck is more on the electro lo-fi spectrum and are more novel and slightly more specialized. On the flip side, with their vocal melodies that extend to the M83 side of the spectrum. It’s funny to throw out M83 and Holy Fuck as comparisons as anyone in their company, should be worth caring about right?
Abso-fucking-lutely (sorry the use of Holy Fuck has given me a tendency to swear more often). Faunts is a great band from start to finish they really show off a sense of an ability to create and diversify. Electro being a very open genre, they really extend the reaches of the genre and keep pushing at times. One special thing is that they seem to just click on all the right parts. They don’t overextend their hand; they keep things simple while throwing a little bit more here and there as you slowly move along. Throw in pop and shoegaze influences; musically they would receive an A+.
They have 3 singers on the helm, each of them with a distinct style. In between sobering and falsetto-type, while each individual singer isn’t rangy, the band definitely has a dynamic many don’t. Each singer is pretty good individually. However, I don’t see it as a major strength…yet. There is some slight disconnect it seems with the music and singers. Vocals are usually in the middle of a sobering tune and when it picks up musically, it either doesn’t use vocals at all or doesn’t quite fit. This is not the case on stand out track, It Hurts Me All The Time but it’s not perfect in other spots of the album.
Another thing before I get to album rating. This album isn’t perfect and doesn’t have the greatest replay value. At times the slow progression falls victim to itself and it’s a very somber/sobering album that can force you to leave it behind (though it’s an album that easy to initially like). This album personally feels like the type, that I’ll forget about in 6 months and return to it and remember why I scored it so high. I like them more then Holy Fuck btw 
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Rating: 4.4 out of 5
It Hurts Me All The Time by Faunts
I Think I’ll Start A Fire by Faunts
Tags: album
