2 out of 5

Label: 54’40 or Fight!

Produced by: Aaron Prellwitz

While the Allmusic and Pitchfork reviewz for Caesura’s More Specific Less Pacific rightfully slam its muddy production style, the approach is actually what helps make the album’s opener – For Staged Encore – it’s best track, and, whether it’s because your ears get used to it, or due to happenstance, or, heaven forfend, something purposeful, the sound gets cleaned up significantly when the disc aggros its way into its last third or so.  Which makes the sound a better fit for the group’s attempts at blending Chicago post-rock with Discord-y punk, but by the same token, it becomes clearer that Caesura maybe isn’t sure if that is what they’re trying to blend.  When, some, uh, dub touches happens on a short instrumental track later, it sticks out as much as an earlier instrumental attempt at speedy-technical stuff that falls flat sans inspiration beyond sounding cool.  At this point, your eyes may drift to the song titles, like Placebo Persuasion, and then the album title itself, and combined with lead singer Evan Rehill’s mealy-mouthed affectations, Caesura starts seeming like they might be some college grads trying to make good on their cool CD collection…

Rewinding, the first track, with its mussed, mastered-too-loud havoc, makes everyone in the group sound like they’re about to rocket out of the studio and careen across any live stage nearby, exploding speakers the whole way.  It’s cluttered for ideas, but it has energy.  Moments of the tracks that follow hint at this, but the group starts leaning more into a DC Fugazi vibe that requires more range and silence than the recording offers.  There are some good riffs happening, for sure, but it’s mixed in with some unconvincing sloppiness, and the band’s unwillingness to commit to a vibe prevents them from having much of an identity.

This stacks onto my impressions of the album’s latter half.

There’s a youtube audio for a track off of their second album, which corrects a lot of what I take issue with here.  From that one song, Caesura sounds to have gone with their Discord inspirations, and though our singer maybe needs to try a different accent, it’s a pretty good song.  That promise is on More Specific Less Pacific, but the group doesn’t do their best to highlight it.