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Album Details

• Artist: The Robot Ate Me
• Album: They Ate Themselves
• Label: Swim Slowly
• Year of Release: 2002
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: dscanland on 2003-03-31

There is a new indie label out there called Swim Slowly who is doing the right thing by starting out slowly and building up a following. Take Tiger Style Records for instance. They started out small and are gaining a fair amount of respect with some quality releases under their belt. They Ate Themselves isn’t an entirely consistent album but it is original. The Robot Ate Me is Ryland Bouchard’s vehicle (you may remember his Bedroom Heroes) that he is now using to get his songs out. While The Robot Ate Me sounds like a bedroom project, it does have the feel of a larger budget recording. Ryland’s voice is similar to Pavement’s Stephen Malkmus and then at times it becomes whispy like Thome Yorke. The songs are not near as intricate as those of Radiohead and some border on annoying. There are some, though, like “They Killed You� that are utterly beautiful. Ryland obviously has some great ideas swimming in his head and he just needs to harness them and feel comfortable throwing some away to pare down an album. As it is, They Ate Themselves is 55 minutes long. It’s still a fairly strong release and I’m interested in seeing what else Swim Slowly has to offer.

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