Foreign Affairs

Description

Fifth album from the beloved Columbus, OH band and first for TiM, after four albums on Columbus label Anyway Records. Features former members of 84 Nash. Since 2013, Columbus, Ohios Connections have made four nearperfect albums of lo-fi pop majesty for the seminal Midwest label Anyway Records, and Foreign Affairs their latest album (and first for Trouble In Mind), continues that winning streak with fifteen songs packed with sardonic tunefulness and Buckeye bombast, firmly planting them in the canon of the Ohio Sound. Connections sprung forth from the ashes of Nineties pop band 84 Nash, infamous for being the only non-GBV related band released on Robert Pollards own Rockathon Records and comparisons to the Indie Rock underdogs seem inevitable, if not a little shortsighted. Connections brand of indie rock definitely has one foot in The Nineties but maintains a classicists penchant for nuanced & timeless rocknroll. Many songs use classic pop structures (see Love Me Stills quiet/loud/quiet power ballad-isms) but subvert them with a clever melodic twist, a bonkers twinguitar solo or unexpected synth squiggle underneath. These guys have done their homework, but nothing feels studied theyve drunk from the waters of the Ohio Underground and the tunes flow forth naturally, with nods to their Nineties brethren (GBV, Breeders, Gaunt) as well as idiosyncratic Midwest legends like Mike Rep and The Quotas or Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments. For every obvious, life-affirming hit on Foreign Affairs (the bouncy Good Cop or bombastic Low Low Low) there are equal numbers of stealthy earworms like the chiming Short Line (with its humming anti-chorus), or the yearning, organ-drenched Downtown to name a few. The sixteen songs ooze familiarity and an instant lyrical relatability, with singer Kevin Elliots lyrics reveling in the everydays little details; good friends, love and rock n roll with restlessness and desire in a harsh, unforgiving but still beautiful world.