Smoldering floorboards are all that remain where once stood a house built high upon beams of influence and pillars of maturation. Smiling high above the embers, Lenola wisps away gleefully flicking matches against the atmosphere and humming a new anthem for the approaching sun. The twelve songs on Lenola’s new full-length, "Treat Me To Some Life" (FT32) emanate warm rays of fulfillment and beg you to bask in the goodness. As signs of shoegaze washed upon Southern New Jersey shores in the form of "Isn’t Anything" and "Chrome" in the early 90s, Jay Laughlin left a world of punk rock infamy for a four-track, drum machine, and delay pedal. After countless demos, Sean Byrne, Dave Grubb, and Scott Colan were recruited to bring Laughlin’s songs to life as Lenola. Soon thereafter, the quartet completed their first LP, "The Last 10 Ft. of the Suicide Mile" and embarked on the first of six national tours they would make in the next four years. As with their debut LP, Lenola’s second full-length, "My Invisible Name", continued their home-recording fascination and further defined them as the undisputed kings of a burgeoning Philadelphia spacerock scene. Perhaps unsatisfied with this title, "My Invisible Name", Lenola’s third album in three years, began distancing the band from effects-laden guitars and droning epics and exhibited the group’s pop undertones and instrument experimentation. Having made impressionable leeway with both fans and critics alike, Lenola holed themselves up for the first six months of ’00 with extensive home studio additions and a catalog of Laughlin’s songs to embellish and create their fourth album. Sparks from Lenola’s "Treat Me To Some Life" sessions surfaced in October ’00 with the release of the five-song"Electric Tickle" EP (FT31.5), featuring "Slipping Under the Shadows" from the forthcoming LP (also released as a one-sided 7" in on Earworm in the UK). Heaving with signs of new instrumentation and pop grooves, the EP reeked of smoke from the havoc to happen. "Treat Me To Some Life" is a gentle inferno. The helium-high vocals of "First Floor Killer" set a precedent that eerily soothes the song’s warbled flute lines and introduces the gentle riff of "Do you Want to See A Volcano?". "Lazy Eye" emits warm, Chet Baker guitar slides, and laid-back percussion before combusting into an early Lips’ mantra. The most notably divergent material on "Treat Me To Some Life" subsists in the keyboard compositions and odd loops of "Derelict Organ" and "Come Down". Although their latest effort seems comparatively subdued to their high-octane live set, "I Don’t Mean" and "Silver Credentials" fling Lenola’s thick energy like a sick, B-movie monster. This is Lenola’s higher burning fire. Their progress is uncontestable, and, from one of the hardest working bands around, it’s plain to see how persistence has paid off. Look for Lenola on the road constantly throughout the early months of ’01.
Fanatic Promotion