Family Crimes

Recording information: Pan American Studio, San Francisco, California (2014).
Born in a land somewhere between the muted earth tones of folk and the wanton experimentalism of avant-garde, Skygreen Leopards' long trek from their free-floating beginnings to the buoyant folk-pop of seventh album, Family Crimes, has taken many turns along the way. Part of the Jeweled Antler Collective, early recordings found the band in an acid-damaged mode, a folksier but still plenty weird offshoot of the noise scene that traded in homemade CD-Rs and limited-edition cassettes. 2006's Disciples of California saw the band make a move toward more pastoral country sounds, with hints of their always-experimental background still coming through. These more traditionally strummy sentiments continued on 2009's Gorgeous Johnny, but five years later, Family Crimes sees the group evolving closer still to a skewed take on pop. The folk and country impulses that have long been part of the band's make-up come from more of an acid-folk angle, with tunes indebted to the Byrds, Gram Parsons, Moby Grape, Neil Young's more hayseed personas, and other psychedelic country dabblers. The reverb-coated "Is It Love, Love, Love?" sounds like it was lifted straight from the Easy Rider soundtrack, while "Josephine" shuffles along with an airy melancholy, hiding synth-derived melodies beneath its bright country strums. When not in country-psych mode, the band turns to more unfamiliar territory in melodic indie pop numbers like "My Friends" or the slightly goth-tinged album-opener "Leave the Family." Family Crimes sees Skygreen Leopards light years away from the experimental, communal folk sounds that they were drawn to in their earliest days, but still retains the same distant dreaminess, though it's more dedicated to melody than any other chapter of the band's epic, shifting discography. ~ Fred Thomas