Montreal's Pottery release their debut album tomorrow (26 June 2020)
Pottery release their debut album ‘Welcome to Bobby’s Motel’ tomorrow (Friday 26 June 2020) on Partisan Records. A celebration of rhythm and groove, Welcome To Bobby’s Motel invites you to set yourself free, veering from highbrow motorik instrumentation to moments of playful discord.
Welcome To Bobby’s Motel was produced by Jonathan Schenke (Parquet Courts, Snail Mail) and recorded at Montreal’s Break Glass studio. Although he occupies a central role within the album’s 11 tracks, it should be noted that Bobby is not technically a real person, and Bobby’s Motel is not a real place. Here’s how the band explains the makeup of this psychedelic dreamworld:
Who is “Bobby,” you ask?
Enter Pottery. Enter Paul Jacobs, Jacob Shepansky, Austin Boylan, Tom Gould, and Peter Baylis. Enter the smells, the cigarettes, the noise, their van Mary, their friend Luke, toilet drawings, Northern California, Beatles accents, Taco Bell, the Great Plains, and hot dogs. Enter love and hate, angst and happiness, and everything in between. Beginning as an inside joke between the band members, Bobby and his “motel” have grown into so much more. They’ve become the all-encompassing alt-reality that the band built themselves, for everyone else. So, in essence, Bobby is Pottery and his motel is wherever they are.
But really, Bobby is a pilot, a lumberjack, a stay at home dad, and a disco dancer that never rips his pants. He's a punching bag filled with comic relief. He laughs in the face of day-to-day ambiguity, as worrying isn’t worth it to Bobby. There’s a piece of him in everyone, there to remind us that things are probably going to work out, maybe. He’s you. He’s him. He’s her. He’s them. Bobby is always there, painted in the corner, urging you to relax and forget about your useless worries. And his motel? Well, the motel is life. It might not be clean, and the curtains might not shut all the way. The air conditioner might be broken, and the floors might be stained. But that’s okay, because you don’t go to Bobby’s Motel for the glamour and a good night’s sleep, the minibar, or the full-service sauna. You go to Bobby’s Motel to feel, to escape, to remember, to distract. You go for the late nights and early mornings, good times and the bad. You might spend your entire life looking for Bobby’s Motel and just when you think you will never find it, you realize you’ve been there all along. It’s filthy and amazing and you dance, and you love it."
Sometimes you hear a new band or an album for the first time, and you just wanna be in a band….. It just sounds so much freaking fun ! That’s what you get with the great debut album from Montreal based five piece band Pottery. ‘Welcome To Bobby’s Motel’ has the feel of a concept album, but where as something like ‘The Tragedy of Street Dog’ by Bethlehem Casuals has a distinct storyt o tell or journey to take you on, this is a concept album more by feel that story. But that unclear structure works well and fits the bands description perfectly. Who is Bobby, where is the Motel, What’s going on, what time is it, are we there yet ? It really leaves you feeling like you have no idea whats going on, but wow was it fun lol !
It explodes to life with an intense drum beat in the title track Welcome to Bobby’s Motel a fast and furious explosion of musical expression. The energy doesn’t dip really from here. Next up we have Hot Heater which is a wonderfully curious mix of Talking Heads and Devo with very David Byrne like lyrics from frontman Austin Boylan. A real highlight on the album for me. This leads onto Under the Wires which has a similar style to it about hazy nights on tour in god knows whereville, with a wonderful vocal track delivered in a kind of staccato Devo style. The two tracks bounce well off each other.
Bobby’s Forecast comes next with its wonderful cowbell disco beat and the rhythm takes to the fore with exceptional drumming throughout. The tempo picks up half way through to reach a furious crescendo.
Another highlight for me is the wonderful Down in the Dumps which has a frantic almost jittery style to it, with erratic guitar plucks reminiscent of an IDLES track. Reflection is a moment of slower calm, with floating guitar chords and rhythmic bass underpinning it all.
But with Texas Drums Pt I & II we see Pottery at their creative best, a song about your favourite drum kit “All my best friends pick up drumsticks, all my best friends play those drums”. The frenzied drums and cowbell are the hero here, but the vocals add a fantastic sort of psychedelic sense to the story telling.
NY Inn feels really on the edge with its manic vocal styling and punchy fast feel. Whats in Fashion made me think of Lux Interior and The Cramps with their classic ‘You Got Good Taste’, just something about the style of the track, so to speak. Taking on the issue of the dangers of substance abuse, Take Your Time changes things up with some almost Cure like guitar work in places and a wonderful catchy bass line running through it, and an almost 80’s like synth undertone.
Finally we arrive at Hot Like Jungle a song of love, probably the slowest track on the album, with a delightful, but subtle steel drum in there ?
But where exactly is here ? ‘Welcome to Bobby’s Motel’ is like a conundrum wrapped in an enigma. Who was Bobby, where’s the Motel, what the hells going on ? But you know what, it’s one of those kinda weird but brilliant journeys, where it doesn’t really matter where here is anyway.
It won’t be to everyone’s taste I’m sure. As a true concept album, it doesn’t have a story theme running through it, and some folk won’t like that concept album feel anyway, and that’s ok. But you know if you stick with the journey through the weird world of Pottery, you’ll come out wondering how you can move and go live in their wonderfully wacky world.
A great debut and a well deserved 8.5 from LiveWire Music. We look forward to diving headlong back into their world soon.
