Oxford Collapse – Bits (2008)

In the hindsight, 00's was a golden decade of guitar-driven indie rock. There were so many of these bands around that many, even really good, bands got lost in the mix. Oxford Collapse may not be even among the best such bands, but at least they have something else to offer besides clean garage rock with disco drumming. In addition to indie rock tradition, Oxford Collapse also draws influences from punk rock. There's also a certain element of noise and lo-fi in the sounds. The vocals are off-key and the main deal seems to be the attitude, rather than interesting songwriting. In that sense, I feel like the band is sort of similar to Modest Mouse or Titus Andronicus. I think I first heard about this band by borrowing the CD from a library. It was released by SubPop and at the time that was almost a guarantee of good music, so I took my chances and it paid off.



I don't think there are that many occasions any more when I would listen to this sort of music at home. This kind of music is meant to be heard live or at least at a party. Being long over 30 years old now, I rarely go to wild parties and the band hasn't existed anymore in years to see them live, so I've kind of lost the most important channels to enjoy this music fully. Then again, this blog is a perfect way for me to remind myself of these albums that I haven't listened to that much.

The album starts with an engine being started and a car speeding off into the distance. The first song Electric Arc has very simple lyrics. It's basically saying just "I can't remember things, I just don't know what to do". Nevertheless, this is a great song, because the attitude is quite amazing. The drumming is beautifully punk while the electric guitars remind me of some more straightforward Sonic Youth songs. The Birthday Wars sounds a bit more like emo music of the late 90's. Bands like Sunny Day Real Estate or Cooper Temple Clause sound quite similar. Vernon-Jackson is proper 90's-style lo-fi with a bit more tuned down off-key sounds. Young Love Delivers is the essence of this band. Wild and enthusiastic guitar-driven songs that sound a bit like drinking songs. In the chorus, everyone's just singing with very little coordination and it all sounds very drunk. A Wedding is a peculiar song played mainly on a cello. I didn't know before that you could make punk rock with a cello, but apparently you can. B-Roll takes the lo-fi sound to a next level. The vocals sound like they had been recorded through a wall.

The music video for Young Love Delivers is very much how you'd expect a music video for a band like this to be like. It's filmed on a bad VHS video camera with the fish-eye lens being used throughout the video. The lyrics are being shown on tiny post-it notes, there are floating cheese burgers and the band playing in a crammed cellar. There are also some pretty ugly moustaches in the video, as there should be in a video for a 2008 indie song.

This is probably one of my least listened to albums that I've bought myself. It doesn't mean that I wouldn't like it. I can truly appreciate this music as very honest. you can really hear that these guys have fun while they're playing. Why they quit after this album, I don't know. There's still a place for a bit of Bits in parties and shindigs in my life.

Listen to the album on Spotify.