Colleen Green - Casey's Tape/ Harmontown Loops

Colleen Green
Casey's Tape/ Harmontown Loops
2018
Spotify

Colleen Green had one of my favorite albums of 2015 I Want to Grow Up. It was a strange and incredibly interesting look at wanting to be a grown up but not really being able to grow up. It had elements of DIY, Punk, Indie and songwriting that was fantastic in it's straightforwardness. It took almost three years but Colleen Green has returned with a new release Casey's Tape / Harmontwon Loops. The first two tracks interestingly are longer than she usually writes, but just as cutting and edgy. You would think just a drum machine and heavily distorted electric guitar would be boring and empty but Colleen makes them soar. "Disco" might seem like the perfect place for a dance track but you will be disappointed this is just another rock song here. Green seems to really be leaning into the drum machine on this record and I can't say I hate it. It really fits with her deadpan singing style giving the low end the same somewhat monotone vibe as her singing. The guitar playing feels like a major upgrade on this album with sweeter solos and licks that really cook. You would think with DIY music that you wouldn't be able to reach those classic rock sort of sounds but Green does it almost effortlessly on tracks like "Lighter". Colleen Green is really similar to Courtney Barnett, they even broke about the same time, but Green's music feels somewhat bigger and bolder, less stories and more rocking.

The Disco we were promised finally makes an appearance on "I Wanna Be Ignored" as Green takes us down this absolutely wild disco experimentation. "Let Go" also challenges her boundaries as the monotone fades during the chorus and we get this sing-a-long of repeated "oh"'s. To be perfectly honest this record does lack some of the lyrical punch and connectivity that the last album had. There was such a visceral connection to Colleen's words on I Want to Grow Up and here they can tend to get lost int he mix at times. The angsty snarl of I Want to Grow Up has been replaced by a more lukewarm vibe, not punching straight through your chest. The mix also felt more vibrant and bold on her previous record. Yet Casey's Tape/Harmontown Loops has a richness all it's own in a totally different way. The expectation was that she would do something exactly like I Want to Grow Up but that concept was so dialed in how would you even go about re-creating it? Green has serious skill and this album has potential, it's not her greatest, but it certainly is a lot better of a lot of rock music being made today.

7.0 out of 10