4TH CURTIS "INVISIBLE AX" REVIEW

       Usually an EP is released for one of 3 reasons: a first release to show their personality, to release b-sides and or songs the band couldn’t use, or in 4th Curtis’s case: to show that they are ready to take the world by storm. Released on November 29th, 2019, Invisible Ax shows 4th Curtis at their strongest.
     Opening with the track “Nonstop”, 4th Curtis entices you in with their familiar combination of guitar, piano, and energetic drumming before exploding into a beautiful mixture of synthesizers and a background chanting of “Blood Blood Blood Blood”. The lyrics center seem to center around lost love that is intertwined with bloodlust, a theme that seems to run throughout the whole EP. “Nonstop” has one of my favorite lyrics on this whole EP with the line: “Everyone’s dancing crazy like honey sped up”. Speaking of lyrics, the second track “Marie Antoinette” has some of the best lyrics in an indie song that I’ve heard in awhile, my favorite part being the bridge where both vocalists, Lex Noens and Ty Gale, sing in hushed, intimate voices asking if you think they are pretty or clever. “Julius Caesar” starts with a cool, slightly melancholic chord progression with the lyrics “Julius Caesar died last night” which I particularly love because I’m a history major specializing in Ancient Rome. After a minute and 30 seconds (or so) of Lex and Ty singing together, the song explodes with the sound of Maddie Morley’s energetic and entertaining drumming. Again, this song is perfectly supplemented by the synthesizers and choir-esque singing in the background.
          Okay, so if there is one thing I love more than anything else in music it’s when bands add a bridge at a different tempo/time signature. “Goth Fuck” is a perfect example of this. A bouncy guitar and piano led song that reminds me of earlier 4th Curtis tracks like “Hercule” or “Everything’s Gone Wrong” while also reminding me of poppy/rocky indie bands of yore like The Unicorns. Halfway through “Goth Fuck”, 4th Curtis suddenly hits you with a left hook, the hook obviously being the tempo change in my sports metaphor. 4th Curtis chose to close out their EP with “No Artist,” easily is my favorite track on this EP and maybe my favorite 4th Curtis track ever. With a minor key piano chord progression and some of my favorite opening lines (“I corner her in the back of the room/I corner her in the bottom of my heart”), it is a slow almost seductive sounding song, it could easily be turned into a Bond movie theme. It reminds me of the masters of dramatic rock, Pulp, but easily out does them by having lyrics that truly sting and not being Cis.
    Invisible Ax shows that 4th Curtis are ready to take the world by storm and it is rightfully deserved. With songs as catchy and emotionally touching as theirs, how could they not be the next big thing?

<a href="http://4thcurtis.bandcamp.com/album/invisible-ax">Invisible Ax by 4th Curtis</a>

4th Curtis:
Lex Noens (they/them) - Songwriting, guitar, vocals
Ty Gale (they/them) - Arranging, vocals, keys, production
Maddie Morley (she/her) - Drums, backing vocals

(Melodic Noise) What is your formed/origin story?
(4th Curtis - Lex) I started 4th Curtis as a solo project but after releasing my first EP, I decided getting shows would be easier if it was a full band. Ty was a friend from school who I had already been showing songs to (they already had their own vocal harmonies to some songs). Maddie was a friend of a friend who I knew was a drummer. Our first practice all together was on Halloween in 2015. The same night, me and Maddie had a sleepover and watched Chicken Run. We all became close really quick!
(4th Curtis - Ty) The first time I heard “Hercule,” the first 4th Curtis release back when it was just Lex and some session musicians, I knew instantly that Lex was the best songwriter I’d ever met and that I wanted to work with them somehow. I was just hoping to be their engineer or something- I was actually a little surprised when they invited me to join the band!
(4th Curtis - Maddie) 4th Curtis was my favorite band back when it was just Lex and it still is. It’s strange to think that my friendships with my bandmates were formed almost entirely after joining the band because the love was instant. Lex was a friend of a friend and Ty was their friend, but they were my best friends by the time the year was over.

(MN) Genre?
(4C) Baroque cripplepop. Bone music.

(MN) Do you have a label?
(4C) Not yet!

(MN) Album name?
(4C - Lex) The first title pitched for this EP was “Beautiful Women/Breakable Men”, which was Ty’s idea. I liked it a lot but in the end it felt too literal. “Invisible Ax” popped into my head and as I applied it to the songs, it grew into a euphemism for the gender binary. Something manmade and menacing but not to the naked eye.

(MN) Lyrically what stands out on the album?
(4C - Lex) It would be easier to list the few lyrics in this EP I’m NOT proud of. The bridge of Marie Antoinette is where we get the most diabolical, which is fun.
(4C - Ty) My favorite lyrics are the ones I contributed, which is the Latin choir in the second chorus of Julius Caesar. Lex had this idea to add a Catholic-y choir part, my mother suggested translating parts of the song into Latin and it all magically worked out. If anyone wants to let me know about a translation error, get in touch.
(4C - Maddie) It all stands out, even if that’s a contradiction. But the chorus of Julius Caesar gets a special mention from me.

(MN) What was the inspiration behind the album?
(4C - Lex) Most of the songs on the EP were unrelated and written years apart: I wrote No Artist and Julius Caesar when I was in high school, Marie Antoinette as a freshman in college, and Goth Fuck a little later. They collected dust because I didn’t think they would work with the narrative I was trying to build with 4th Curtis. But I still had a soft spot for Marie Antoinette, and Ty came up with a harmony for Goth Fuck that revitalized my interest in the song, so I decided we could take a short detour before our next full length and make an EP of these unloved songs that all centered around themes of gender and sexuality and romance. I wrote the first track, Nonstop, with the intention of creating a kind of foreword to what I looked at as four short stories.
(4C - Ty) My work was inspired by loving our first record I Won The Pageant dearly and wanting to elevate every single aspect of it. The arranging, the harmonies, the production and the sax represent literal years of effort on my part and I’m so, so proud of how it turned out. I wanted to create beautiful meat deserving of its place on the bones of Lex’s songs.
(4C - Maddie) I can only speak of my drums, but if I had to describe my drum work on this EP in one word it would be “angry”. Not aggressive and powerful, but desperate. A book thrown across the room in an act of frustration, regret that can only be expressed in a collapse onto the floor.

(MN) What do you hope people take away from the album?
(4C - Lex) That 4th Curtis is not to be fucked with! That trans people rule every genre of music! And I hope it gets stuck in peoples’ heads!
(4C - Ty) That evangelizing us to all their friends elevates their cool level tenfold!
(4C - Maddie) That they can and should get into music no matter how few people who look like them they see in the scene!

(MN) Is there something that connects the songs together?
(4C - Lex) Marie Antoinette and Julius Caesar are both songs about being trans. Goth Fuck and No Artist are both songs about desiring another person. Put together, they tell a layered story of discomfort and desperation and lust, which I think a lot of people can relate to.
(4C - Ty) I would say the connective tissue is the knowledge that despair is a symptom of capitalism and inequity, not of life, and that catharsis is better than hope.
(4C - Maddie) Our lyrics describe a world in which it’s impossible to feel truly comfortable. In which victories are scarce and trying always comes with pain. But in this world, it’s still possible and necessary to find time to rejoice, to celebrate, and to love.

(MN) Are you locals or transplants?
(4C - Lex) I moved here in 2014 to go to college. School didn’t work out, but I ended up getting really attached to the Twin Cities. I grew up in a really rural part of New York state.
(4C - Ty) I’m a local! I’ve lived in a bunch of places in Minnesota but I’m most fond of St. Paul, where I live right now.
(4C - Maddie) Local to the state but new to the cities proper. Until recently I lived in Coon Rapids.

(MN) What are some of your influences and Minnesota influences?
(4C - Lex) My idol is a Canadian songwriter named Alden Penner. My ultimate goal as a musician is to make other people feel the same way his music makes me feel. I’m also really influenced by the Cribs, Mitski, Neil Cicierega, Hot Chip, and Robert Pollard. The local bands that inspire me the most are Gully Boys, Catbath, and Lunch Duchess. If we could be considered in their ranks, I’d be happy.
(4C - Ty) Ditto to everything Lex and Maddie said. My influences are a real mess, but off the top of my head I’d say Kamasi Washington, Astor Piazzolla, Sevdaliza, Janelle Monáe, Florence and the Machine, Eartha Kitt, Chloe X Halle, Superorganism, early Marina and the Diamonds and Queen.
(4C - Maddie) I take inspiration from a variety of artists, including quite a few I don’t even like but can’t shake the influence of. Among those I do like are Lizzo, Frank Zappa, Mitski, Stevie Wonder, and The Kinks. Locally of course there’s The Controversial New Skinny Pill, Gully Boys, and The Florists.

(MN) Who are some of your favorite current Twin Cities artists?
(4C) Catbath, Lunch Duchess, Gully Boys, The Controversial New Skinny Pill, Allergen, The Smokes, Ahem, Static Panic, The Florists, Joe Bartel, Daniel Bonespur, The Smokes, etc etc!

(MN) What is your favorite venue to play and see shows at in Twin Cities?
(4C - Lex) All my favorite shows were at the Triple Rock! Rest in peace. 7th Street is great and you always know what you’re gonna get, which isn’t true about enough venues.
(4C - Ty) Cedar Cultural Center!
(4C - Maddie) I wish I could still say the Triple Rock, but since I can’t, I have to go with 7th Street.

(MN) What can fans expect when they come to your shows?
(4C - Lex) Our recordings of songs are completely different from the way we play them live -- we only have three pairs of hands onstage so there’s a lot less instrumentation and a lot more sweat! Our secret weapon is Maddie - she’s the best, most theatrical drummer in town.
(4C - Ty) You can estimate how much I liked the gig based on how enthusiastically I get my bra out during Hercule.
(4C - Maddie) Lust, jealousy, awe, inspiration, excitement, love, arousal, and that’s just from watching me!

(MN) Do you have a favorite or crazy memory of playing a show?
(4C - Lex) I feel like all our crazy show stories involve another person or venue being crazy and I don’t want to get in trouble.
(4C - Ty) My favorite memories are the moments of deep, unending solidarity when I talk with another person of color and realize we’re both pissed off at the same white dude at the show.
(4C - Maddie) To avoid us getting into trouble: That time that some **** *** made us ***** because we were *** ********.

(MN) Who are your dream tour-mates?
(4C - Lex) Any band our friends are in! Gully Boys and Allergen both come to mind because I love spending time with them and I know we would all get along.
(4C - Ty) Mitski!! But I would be happy to tour with anyone who was chill and regularly showered.
(4C - Maddie) Ty has expressed that touring with Mitski is something of a music career dream for them, and I have to agree. But more realistically, Gully Boys and Controversial New Skinny Pill.

(MN) Other hobbies?
(4C - Lex) I love to draw and read comics! Before I realized I wanted to be a musician, my dream was to be a comic artist.
(4C - Ty) I run tabletop roleplaying games with my friends and I love to write! Fiction, nonfiction and fanfiction, baby! I also co-founded and help run TIGERRS, a local trans, intersex and gender-expansive direct services organization.
(4C - Maddie) Drawing and writing! I’d love to create an indie game at some point, but in the meantime it’s fun to just create ideas and art for it.

(MN) What do you like about living in the Twin Cities?
(4C - Lex) This is the first place I’ve ever had a lot of really good friends. I love that it’s impossible to find a bad banh-mi. I love Culver’s. I love the specific subgenres of music that live here.
(4C - Ty) There’s a lot to love (and a lot to work on), but my favorite little thing is meeting other trans people who don’t live in Powderhorn. Love you, Powderhorn, but St. Paul is rad too.
(4C - Maddie) Nearly everyone I love lives here, at least everyone I love that I’ve actually met. There’s so much more that makes it good, but the people make it great.

(MN) What are your favorite places to grab food or drink in the Twin Cities?
(4C - Lex) Ty introduced us to Boca Chica Taco House in St. Paul which I’m never not in the mood for. And I know it’s not a secret, but Moon Palace’s pizza is so damn good.
(4C - Ty) El Burrito Mercado on the West Side and Afro Deli!
(4C - Maddie) Can’t go wrong with Moon Palace!

(MN) Day jobs?
(4C - Lex) Nothing consistent.
(4C - Ty) Praying to get hired for the job I phone interviewed for a couple weeks ago! Other than that, I freelance, because we live in a nightmare society.
(4C - Maddie) Nothing, please hire me, I’m very cute!

(MN) What are the band's plans for the future?
(4C - Lex) We want to dip our toes into the touring world in spring! And after we recover from Invisible Ax, we’ll be ready to record our next full-length, which is truly my magnum opus. I don’t say that to undermine our EP- Invisible Ax is a perfect hors d'oeuvres to the meal we have planned.
(4C - Ty) Communist revolution and/or a long legacy of inspiring trans people, disabled people and people of color to make radically honest art. I would also be down to get gay married to someone and stomp on a mason jar instead of a glass.
(4C - Maddie) We’ve got big plans! I don’t know which I’m more excited for, our first tour or our next full length.

Make sure to catch 4th Curtis live on March 13th at Eagles 34 with Kat & the Hurricane, Candace Griffin, and Poorwill

Review by: Melodic Noise Media
Interview and edited by: Andrew Perrizo, Owner @PlaylistTC