![\"\"](\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/chris_church_darling_please.jpg\")
The Posies came out of the Pacific Northwest with a sound that had little to do with grunge; the duo (later a full band) combined power pop sensibility with a shoegaze aesthetic, seamlessly welding sterling melodies and heart-rending vocals\/lyrics to emotionally charged, powerful and soaring rock.<\/p>\n
Why, one may well ask, am I introducing a review of an album from North Carolina-based multifarious artist Chris Church by discussing The Posies? The answer is simple: after a stunning run of albums building on the musical approach I\u2019ve described above \u2013 and a series of records that included Failure<\/em>, the scintillating Dear 23<\/i> and the near-perfect Frosting on the Beater<\/i> — the Posies initiated a course correction. Amazing Disgrace<\/i> was a far harder, denser record that \u2013 to my ears, anyway \u2013 was shorter on the melodic sense that lay at the foundation of the Posies sound.<\/p>\n In idle moments since, I\u2019ve occasionally found myself wondering what a fourth Posies album that continued with the group\u2019s original direction might have sounded like. And I\u2019m here to report that I have found the answer. Released in 2022 (but recorded in 2011), Darling Please<\/i> is the newest offering from Chris Church.<\/p>\n It should be emphasized that it\u2019s not as if Church is (was) overtly following on, attempting to craft and album to serve as a worthy successor to Frosting on the Beater<\/i>. I mean, who\u2019d do that 18 years after that record\u2019s release? And Church himself has never been one to stay in his own lane, as it were: if his body of work is defined by any overriding characteristics, they\u2019re (a) high quality and (b) eclecticism. His \u201cstyle,\u201d so to speak, handily and impressively encompasses everything from metal to pop and many points in between.<\/p>\n Darling Please<\/em> manages the feat of being gauzy and crystalline all at once. The powerful, sustained distorted chords ring out over the sonic landscape, while the rock-solid rhythm section does its thing and Church\u2019s impassioned voice soars over the whole affair. Washes of sound blur into one another, and that introspective shoegaze vibe imbues all the music with a thoughtful character that matches the vocals.<\/p>\n Darling Please<\/em> was recorded in Church\u2019s basement, but the production values are superb, with not a hint of DIY-ness to them. And as great as the album seems to have been in its original form, as released now it has been remixed, adding new vocals from the musically simpatico and always-welcome Lindsay Murray of Gretchen\u2019s Wheel. It\u2019s a testament to both her talents and Church\u2019s skill (as a musician, producer and engineer) that Murray\u2019s vocals sound as if they\u2019ve always been part of the songs; there\u2019s not a whiff of overdubbiness in evidence.<\/p>\n To re-emphasize, Darling Please<\/i> isn\u2019t a Posies pastiche; it\u2019s a wholly original work. That said, the arrangement and vocal harmonies on \u201cAtlantic\u201d \u2013 a standout tune that\u2019s buried mid-album \u2013 are sure to remind one of the more swoonworthy, emotionally resonant moments of Dear 23<\/i>. And in light of some very unpleasant developments (which have nothing to do with Church and which we won\u2019t discuss here), there won\u2019t be any more Posies records. Darling Please<\/i> could easily serve as the Great Lost Posies Album, but of course it deserves a grander fate than that.<\/p>\n A deft balance of sweet and sour, rough and smooth, sharp and blurry, Chris Church\u2019s Darling Please<\/i> is also a sterling release destined for consideration when the time comes to look at 2022\u2019s best releases.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Posies came out of the Pacific Northwest with a sound that had little to do with grunge; the duo (later a full band) combined power pop sensibility with a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22621,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49,51,62,65,67],"tags":[4161,4357,3854],"class_list":["post-22620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-new-release","category-pop","category-rawk","category-review","category-shoegaze","tag-big-stir-records","tag-chris-church","tag-lindsay-murray","cat-49-id","cat-51-id","cat-62-id","cat-65-id","cat-67-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22620"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22620\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22646,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22620\/revisions\/22646"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}