Diamond Rings / PS I Love You - All Yr Songs / Facelove
(2009)
Label : Hype Lighter
Credits : Mixing.
Info :
Honest-to-goodness, hard-line indie rock is alive and well in the great white North. "Facelove"-- a ferociously catchy single from Kingston, Ontario, duo PS I Love You-- was the hiding on the B-side of a shared 7" with "All Yr Songs", last fall's Best New Music-approved track from Toronto's Diamond Rings. Sorry we didn't catch the flipside sooner. "Facelove" is a towering tribute to art of the build, helmed by juicy, punched-up guitar work that demands to be felt (if not just plain gawked at). Part of me thinks that PS I Love You could have gotten away with dubbing their half "All Yr Bands", as they shred like Ratatat on a ZZ Top kick through a Wolf Parade stomper, or Broken Social Scene crashing a high school battle-of-the-bands, just to revel in beating living hell out of any pimpled Zep cover band who dared show their face. Except here, they do all that with only two guys, a stiff backbeat, and a ton of a great licks. Impressive stuff. - Zach Kelly (Pitchfork.com)
Toronto's John O'Regan is the man behind Diamond Rings. His main act, the D'Urbervilles, is a collective of pastiche rockers that invokes everything from hip-hop to the Minutemen. Flipping through the D'Ubervilles' MySpace, I wound up taking notes like "Les Savy Fav goes flamenco," throwing around all sorts of rockcrit bull phrases. But "pop" wasn't a word that came up; with the D'Ubervilles, it just seems like a concept that they circle around. Diamond Rings, however, finds O'Regan diving in. "All Yr Songs" is as linear and welcoming as homemade tunes get, with its irresistible "oh-oh-uh-oh" ululations dissipating any sense of stick-in-the-mud Britt Daniel coolness (and it's fun to hear a gulping James Murphy-esque voice doing those Amanda Palmer/Regina Spektor hiccups). My only complaint is a missed lyrical opportunity: "You right my wrongs/ I write all your songs" could have been perfect, but O'Regan follows with "I love to sing all your songs." He does pretty well with his own, too. - Dan Weiss (Pitchfork.com)