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Album Details

• Artist: French Toast
• Album: In A Cave
• Label: Dischord
• Year of Release: 2005
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: dscanland on 2005-06-30

What do the bands Nation of Ulysses, Make Up, Fidelity Jones, All Scars, Las Mordidas and Fugazi have in common? If you said they all feature either Jerry Busher or James Canty you would have been correct. Jerry Busher has actually been a touring member of Fugazi for the last 8 years. Anyway, the time had come for the two to do their own project and that's exactly where French Toast fits in. This is one of those albums that is really hard to put your finger on. There are some electronic samples mixed with their style of post-punk and yet there are also some jazz elements thrown in to confuse you even more. Think of Ian MacKaye's recent project, The Evens, for how different French Toast actually is.
The album opens up with "Float Away", a track heavily arranged around a post-punk guitar sound but features some fairly accessible vocals from James. Then they easily move into a little more rhythmic territory with the beat heavy "Pattern". One of my favorite tracks is "What I See", almost sounding like an old 80s pop song but distinguished by the guitar tone and the casio style drum beat. "Lion's Den" is a little more straight-forward in the rock department. The arrangements on In A Cave are fairly sparse but really work with Busher and Canty's experience. "Seen Me" is a creepy track that is a little quieter but dark and builds as it progresses, yet another highlight in this clever album.
For those of you who mourn the loss of Dismemberment Plan you might check out French Toast for something along the same line. This is great music that inspires.

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