Baby Teeth 'The Simp' album

Since their 2004 formation, Baby Teeth have proven that bedroom pop and huge hooks belong together. The band has been compared to a host of legendary pop eccentrics: Todd Rundgren, Andy Pratt, Elvis Costello. And yet, it’s Baby Teeth’s unique appropriation of classic-rock icons that sets them apart from other indie-pop acts. “We’ve never played with a band that sounded so much like Queen,” remarked the Fiery Furnaces’ Eleanor Friedberger after an early show. Even while sharing the stage with such indie-rock luminaries as the Fiery Furnaces, Silver Jews, Pit er Pat and Man Man, Baby Teeth have remained true to a singular vision: the intimacy of one lonely heart, shot through an arena-sized cannon.

This spring, Baby Teeth releases its third disc, The Simp (Lujo). While the new album’s lavish arrangements nod to the pop of the 60s and 70s, the lyrics are direct and emotionally bare. Fittingly, songwriter Abraham Levitan is recording under his own name for the first time, abandoning the pseudonym, Pearly Sweets, that he’d used since his teens. (He’d taken the moniker initially because he thought it sounded “more New Orleans” than his given name, and he was probably right.) The album opens with the title track, a tale of a depressive, introverted teenager trying in vain to connect through music: “Claustrophobe living in my room / I prayed that life would consume / My song / And push me along.” In vintage Baby Teeth fashion, the downer lyrics lean against a relentlessly pounding, sing-along groove. The album’s centerpiece is the pocket epic “Looking for a Road”, a wry take on the futility of listening to others’ advice: “They say be energetic baby be yourself / But what they really mean is fuck the pain away like everyone else / Selling what you got but it never sells.” “That song is so excellent,” remarked Silver Jews’ David Berman, “I can’t believe it was written by a contemporary American.”

In recording The Simp, Baby Teeth worked with an outside producer for the first time. They chose avant-garde musician Blue Hawaii, a member of Bablicon, Need New Body, and Icy Demons. The collaboration was charmed. For every big pop chorus, there’s a left-of-center twist: the hard blues swagger of “Diaghalev Was Right” veers into a meticulously crafted clarinet-and-violin passage, while the throb of “Intolerable” erupts into a free-jazz-meltdown coda reminiscent of Fun House. The Simp is an album of remarkable refinement, uniting the pop songcraft of The Baby Teeth Album (2005) with the eccentric home-recording ethos of the band’s 2006 EP For the Heathers. A pairing of highway-wide hooks and intimate lyrics, it takes just a few spins to carry you away.

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Baby Teeth - The Simp