CD Reviews

Antiques | No Fortune

self-released (2009)

By IAN SANDS | July 14, 2009

3.5 Stars

Tim Griffiths and Steve Ged, the main men behind Arlington-based Antiques, packaged their new CD with a 25-page "guide to the album" featuring photos, a short story, and poems. It's an impressively earnest gesture, but do the songs deserve such love? I think so.

No Fortune, the band's third release, grabs you not by the shirt collar but about the waist — and sweetly. Its melodies are familiar and warm. More whimsical are the tales here, which are twisted slices of melodrama. On an Antiques song, folks say things like "Oh Lord remember me/If I am not your own what am I?" Houses are burned (okay, just one). And occasionally somebody gets hanged. "I'm Home" is about a murderer who suffers that fate and his daughter, who asks God to spare him. The accompaniment to these grim verses is surprisingly buoyant (check the accordion of Billy Durette).

"I'm Home" is a blast, swift and raggedy like a balloon popped mid-flight. The closer, "Wasting Time," describes a bloody fight with a brute. The band, singing in unison over a shambling score, sounds so thrilled to be there that you feel something closer to joy than pain.

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Topics: CD Reviews , Tim Griffiths, Tim Griffiths, Antiques, More

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