Colour Me Wednesday- 'Counting Pennies In The Afterlife' Album Review

Tracklist:

1. Sunriser

2. Boyfriend's Car

3. Edge Of Everything

4. Heather's Left For Dead

5. Exposure

6. Disown

7. Sad Bride

8. Tinfoil

9. Entrepreneur

10. Take What You Want (And Then Leave)

11. Not My Turf

There exists a video on YouTube in which Faith No More frontman Mike Patton lambasts Aussie rockers Wolfmother. ‘Are you hearing this shit’ he says; staring into the camera. He is being interviewed backstage while the aforementioned band rock out to thousands. Patton exists in the present. He is a modernist. He is someone who does not care much for retro. And to some degree, I think his reaction is justified. I am someone who concurs with Baudrillard’s notion that the ‘demythologisation of the past’ leads to a discourse in history. Retro does not represent the past, it simply emulates it. Of course this is not to say we cant take from past, indeed, we should always use bits to voice our concerns in a creative fashion. Lets take Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers, a film laced with post-modernism and cliche. It gives a narrative that can only really be understood through pastiche and shared cultural imagery or things a viewer can recognise and understand. 'Counting Pennies In The Afterlife' by Colour Me Wednesday is a record that does the same job. It disintegrates Rock (rock history) and remoulds it into something else entirely.

‘Sunriser’ is the first track of the record. It’s a song that revs up like Mudhoney and breaks out into sunshine infused Post-Punk. ‘I feel the cold before you feel it’; words uttered over a sole electric guitar before it goes all staccato. Indeed the ’feel’ of the tune, with its stops and starts, showcases the bands particular attention to detail. Eventually we get to very mid nineties - ‘Pixies’-esque chorus, with some, dare I say, 50s style cha cha drum beats. It is a very clever and meticulous piece of work, wonderfully textured with various forms of dexterity.

Sixth track, ’Disown’, is a cool Indie Pop ‘shuffle’ that flirts with Pop-Rock from both sides of the pond. ‘I disown, completely, like I disown myself’, a ‘chant’ that strikes at the heart of the listener. Its backed up by a scorched shoe gaze’y guitar. A wonderful tune that could easily fall into Nirvana’s 'In Utero'. ‘Entrepreneur’ is a song for everyone who feels a little bit lost. The pressure of having to know your way in life whilst, at the same time, having to sift through chaos and expectation. I love the phrase ‘Im an entrepreneur, looking for investors’, I hear it as a voice sarcastically hitting back at the those who dismay at those pursuing a career in art.

'Counting Pennies In The Afterlife' is really a record for all music lovers. On the surface, listeners may take this a well done Pop-Indie record, but really, this is a powerful piece of art.

The band chose to invest to socio-economic issues and sing about how such issues effect us as people. It's a record that captures the fire of Seattle Grunge, it includes bits of Garage-Rock and mixes it with a healthy dose of Alternative Pop.