Warpaint

The Fool

Four cooler-than-you girls, three from Cali and and one from (I'm guessing) England, took the latter part of a decade to perfect their shoegaze-meets-prog sound, the result being their debut full-length, The Fool. (One of the gals, drummer Stella Mozgawa, is new. Actress Shannyn Sossamon was the original drummer, followed by a number of stand-ins.) The longstanding core trio of friends, Emily Kokal (vocals, guitar), Theresa Wayman (guitars, vocals) and Jenny Lee Lindberg (bass, vocals), are the true California girls, Wayman being the bashful gal who offed herself in The Rules of Attraction and Lindberg the sister of Sossamon. Oh, and I think Kokal dated someone famous for a while - maybe a Red Hot Chili Pepper. So yes, these are cool girls who ooze charisma and stage presence and make very watchable music videos (check out the super cool "Stars" for proof). But who cares about actresses and videos and sisters; can the Warpaints make albums that are worth buying and listening to, or are they just good on paper and screen?

Well, for starters, this music on The Fool isn't simple stuff. These girls aren't The Long Blondes, The Dum Dum Girls or The Vivian Girls. Warparint are heavily influenced by a number of the best bands from the 1980s - the ones who made big, dense productions. Bands like Cocteau Twins, The Sundays, Kate Bush, Dead Can Dance and even The Cure, amongst others, come to mind as The Fool's nine tracks pass by. The songs, all made to set hazy midnight moods, rely heavily on their constant drone and powerful vocals, which, in a way, often remind of The Bends-era Thom Yorke. Oh, and sometimes Bjork, depending on who sings (Kokal is the lead, but everyone keeps a mic close by).

My introduction to Warpaint was through a very well made video for an EP track called "Elephants.) That song, along with the aforementioned "Stars" and another cut called "Billie Holiday," put Warpaint on the national map, landing them not only solid label interest, but also summer festival gigs and photo-hungry media coverage. When on stage you can feel their young, excited energy, even when they're playing it cool (which is pretty much all the time) you can feel their love for their craft. They had the look, talent and appeal needed years ago to get big attention, but, like any good band, took their time to really perfect their complex sound. The proof is everywhere on the often epic, groove-heavy The Fool, feeling like a Throwing Muses record made for both shoegaze and Bjork fans. I'd even argue that Warpaint could do well with the jam band crowd, given how important the quartet's chemistry is to their sound.

A fine debut that will easily earn them Warpaint a cult following made up of hip 80s AOR fans, college girls and horny boys, The Fool isn't quite everything I'd hoped it would be after hearing last year's excellent Exquisite Corpse EP. Warpaint made the rookie mistake of leaving some of their best songs off their all-important record in favor of material recorded more recently, after the introduction of Mozgawa. And while that move might bring the breaking band the solidarity they think they need before entering the spotlight, the result is a debut that could've so easily been twice the record. All that said, The Fool is a sturdy introduction to a band whose best days are ahead. My recommendation: see 'em live in the small clubs before they hit the big theater circuit.   6/10

Written by G. William Locke