The Ladybug Transistor -- The Ladybug TransistorMergeOct. 3, 2003
Somewhere at the intersection of day-dreaming and fantasy you will find The Ladybug Transistor, a"conceptual pop" group from Brooklyn. The band's unique instrumentation (12 string guitar, strings, horns and countless keyboards) lends the music on The Ladybug Transistor -- the bands fifth album -- that dream-rock feel heard from British chamber pop groups.
"These Days In Flames" lulls you immediately into this musical dreamland. The single-note piano fills that curl in and out of the song at regular intervals, and the guitar licks that accompany them give the song a fairy-tale feel. Gary Olson sings over top of this in a voice that sounds like a mocking impersonation of Elvis.
In "Song For The Ending Day," Olson informs us, "I could take a year just to climb all the hills in the Catskills. ... Oh Yeah." I'm sure it could, buddy, but I still wouldn't know what the hell you're talking about.
Even when the band shows its instrumental diversity such as on "Chokin On Air" and "Hangin' On The Line" with trumpet and violin flourishes, they are overproduced to sound very similar to the rest of the album."Please Don't Be Long"provides the only exception, with a strange, rollicking carnival-music chord progression on the organ and a fiery blues guitar line that the others lack.
The Ladybug Transistor is a lot like a very well made therapeutic sounds tape. The only thing missing is the sounds of whales or crashing waves, or sighing hipsters.
