The Globes

Although The Globes hail from Spokane, WA (and currently reside there), the band’s story is perhaps best told starting in Seattle, where, fresh out of high school in the summer of 2007, the members moved into a tiny house and dedicated themselves to playing and studying music. This early time in Seattle was one of intense personal growth, and a time of overriding focus. The band’s early incarnation back home in Spokane once boasted seven members and aimed for a more cinematic sound, but as a quartet they learned to do more with less. They began to develop a dedicated following in the Pacific Northwest, and then in the last year or so have been introduced to a national audience via a series of tours with Menomena, Minus the Bear, A Place to Bury Strangers, Maps & Atlases, Two Door Cinema Club, and others.

While in Seattle, The Globes met noted producer John Goodmanson (Blonde Redhead, Unwound, Sleater-Kinney), and made Future Self. It’s a rich and magnificent album that, as Walt Whitman would say, contains multitudes…and maybe a few contradictions. The album’s under-35-minute running time comprises eight songs, each a vibrant composition in its own right, and each brimming with yearning melodies, bright guitars, bombastic charges of sound, and an amazing rhythm section. Bassist Sean McCotter and drummer Marcus Ourada helm the melodies and rhythms of the songs, allowing songwriters Kyle Musselwhite and Erik Walters to take a more textured approach to their guitar playing and singing. Despite the band’s relative youth, Future Self displays the narrative flow, adventurous complexity, and drive of a sprawling post-rock opus by a seasoned band. It’s a combination that often recalls Sunny Day Real Estate, pre-millennial Radiohead, and even, at times, R.E.M. at their murky best.

But The Globes don’t consider any of those bands as an influence, instead citing jazz musicians and Avant classical composers, not to mention the likes of Arthur Russell, The Ventures, Yes, and Toto. And once their actual affinities are mentioned by the band in conversation, one can indeed hear identifiable traces in their recordings. But rather than feeling crowded with a rabble of competing musical concepts, Future Self always leaves room to breathe – a clean atmosphere bolstered by Goodmanson’s sterling production. Even the album’s more harrowing and claustrophobic moments are performed with grace, and are balanced always by the presence of sonic breathing room, lyrical open spaces, and thematic escape routes.

As is their way, The Globes labored hard over the sequencing of Future Self, and the payoff is evident with each spin. The album’s first half is accented by ringing echoes and a scratchy interplay that recalls Fugazi at their mid-nineties peak, while the second half recalls the jazzy tautness of Tortoise... That is until you reach “Face Up Facing” – the album’s epic closer that focus all of Future Self’s alluring facets into one singularly perfect burst. The moment the guitars are strangled to a halt will demand you listen to the whole thing again. And, chances are, you will.