I was very excited to see JAWS. In all honesty, I was looking forward to it for months prior to the gig. Luckily I was about to come down with a horrific case of the flu the night of the show, so I downed enough medicine and caffeine to stop the black plague and rocked out as best I could:
Opening with tracks from their recently-released third album, The Ceiling, the ethereal atmosphere visually and musically was emblematic of a balance that the band looks to find in their music: something between being overwhelmed and nihilistic. Throughout their set, there was a search for answers, or a resolution to confusion. On ‘Just a Boy’ or on ‘Stay In’, lead singer, Connor Schofield sang, “Tell me what you do/ If I don’t hear from you,” because when you don’t know the answer to something, your mind is usually your worst enemy. There was no better example of this recurring dichotomy of ‘all or nothing’ emotional turmoil than during, ‘Think Too Much, Feel Too Little’.
Their latest record expands their sounds with more songs that have focused, rhythmic breakdowns in the place of the more punk- and angst-driven songs on their earlier records, Simplicity and Be Slowly. However, for JAWS, the variety of their performance and music is their dexterity and ability to have an album that’s one genre and and also ten.
JAWS’ nu-gaze and dream-pop sound stands out in a genre where laissez-faire is the status quo. Each song has a different influence from a band spanning the decades, from Bowie to The Cure to Dinosaur Jr. to Slowdive.
the sounds in my head... 