The Sophtware Slump (CD)

Active in the 1990s and early 2000s, these Modesto, California natives specialized in alternative rock that was paradoxically electronic and futuristic while remaining strangely organic and rustic. Their farmhand look indicated that they lean towards the latter, but their knack for computer-based sounds, particularly on their acclaimed SOPHTWARE SLUMP, revealed that they drew as much influence from Radiohead as from Neil Young. Led by singer-songwriter Jason Lytle, the band built a large fan base through endless touring and consistently engaging albums.

• Category:  Music  »  Rock & Pop  »  General Rock & Pop
• Format: CD   Learn more about the CD format using Tower WIKI.
• Release Date: February 1, 2006
• Label: V2 Records (USA)
• UPC: 638812706829
• WAPI (Tower ID): 106470629
• Average Customer Review: There are no customer reviews yet. Be the first to write a review!
• Tower.com Sales Rank: #42994 in Music (See Top 100 Music Bestsellers)
• #14307 in Rock & Pop (See Top 100 Rock & Pop Bestsellers)
• #9068 in General Rock & Pop (See Top 100 General Rock & Pop Bestsellers)

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Rolling Stone (6/8/00, p.124) - 3.5 stars out of 5 - "...Exhilarating....a loose indie-rock suite about how sad and funny and fleeting technology actually is....[frontman Jason] Lytle's rigorous, knotty songwriting skills check his band's yen for indie-rock messiness..."
Spin (1/01, p.76) - Ranked #6 in Spin's "10 Best Records You Didn't Hear Of The Year [2000]" - "...Obsessively melodic snatches of indie pop..."
Entertainment Weekly (6/23/00, p.102) - "...Their melodies, earthy but otherworldly, infiltrate your head before retreating into space..." - Rating: A-
Q (1/01, p.91) - Included in Q's "50 Best Albums of 2000".
Q (6/00, p.106) - 4 stars out of 5 - "...This year's chosen chunk of cosmic Americana...sounding like a lo-fi ELO and...possesses an admirably unusual songwriter....Cheap, cheerful and utterly charming."
Magnet (1-2/01, p.45) - Included in Magnet's "20 Best Albums of 2000".
Magnet (6-7/00, p.77) - "...Works within a tradition of records that owe as much to the Echoplex as they do to impending nervous breakdowns and squandered cash advances. And that's what makes it a keeper..."
CMJ (1/08/01, p.12) - Included in CMJ's "Best of the Year" for 2000.
CMJ (5/00, p.61) - "...Poignant and peculiar....suggesting a stoned...version of [the Flaming Lips'] eccentrics..."
Melody Maker (5/9/00, p.52) - 3 stars out of 5 - "...Low-budget artwork, fuzzy synths and utterly bizarre song titles...all ring large, Pavement-sounding alarm bells....[the] opening track 'He's Simple, He's Dumb, He's The Pilot' [is] one of the most perfectly crafted songs you'll hear..."
Mojo (Publisher) (6/00, p.100) - "...Warm and sunny (though unsettlingly so)...like the eels fronted by a young, easily-breakable Neil Young....The use of computers and electronic SFX emphasizing their dark, distorting, disturbing qualities..."
NME (Magazine) (12/30/00, p.77) - Ranked #12 in NME's "Top 50 Albums Of The Year" - "...The finest LP made by men with beards..."

Grandaddy includes: Jason Lytle.

Recorded at Little Portugal, Modesto, California.

THE SOPHTWARE SLUMP is a kick in the pants for anyone who believes that indie-rock is, after a notable creative peak in the mid-'90s, dying a slow and stupefying death. Not with underground sounds like these around. Guided by Jason Lyttle's vision of spacey, mid-fi country-rock, Modesto, CA's Grandaddy unites a mess of guitar-based, late-90's fringe-musics into coherent statements about humanity and technology--and if it at times sounds a lot like OK COMPUTER or a lower-fidelity SOFT BULLETIN, that's partly the point.

As the band has grown, the classic indie sound of Pavement has ceased to be its sole touchstone. Sparklehorse's studio-created ambient-Gothic bleeds have taken a strong hold, as has Radiohead's symphonic balladeering. But, mixed in an unselfconscious manner, these influences underline Lyttle's desire to have the music convey the era's confusion. So the epic mid-tempo opener "He's Simple, He's Dumb, He's the Pilot" recalls the stilted pace of "Paranoid Android," "Broken Household Appliance National Forest" is a metaphorically lumbering rocker whose sounds spill over like punky stoners doing Black Sabbath, and "Chartsengrafs" rocks out in first-rate VIVADIXIE fashion. SOPHTWARE is the sum of its grand parts.

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