Thee Oh Sees - Help [Album]

In The Red

Anyone who is aware of John Dwyer’s work whilst fronting garage-rockers Pink and Brown and Coachwhips, will know that he is an artist who makes music on his own terms. Those terms have not often included ‘great melody’, or ‘write all the best songs the best garage bands of the 60’s never got around to writing’. At least that was case before Dwyer decided to flesh out his OCS solo project into a fab foursome. San Fran’s Thee Oh Sees’ debut album The Master’s Bedroom Is Worth spending a Night In demonstrated that Dwyer wanted this new project to be an outlet for a more melodic, dare I say pop-driven side that nobody else really knew existed within him.

Help continues this new approach to excellent effect. Tracks such as opener “Enemy Destruct”, “Go Meet The Seed” and closer “Peanut Butter Oven” are replete with melody, not to mention bundles of charm. The album is just intensely listenable; one of those that is easy to find yourself in the mood for. Even when the Thee Oh Sees wander off into extended jams, such as during “Ruby Go Home” and “Meat Step Lively”, your interest is always firmly held, not to mention your ass firmly shaken.

As with The Black Lips, their influences are blatant, so blatant that there is little point in listing them here. The crucial point to make though is that, like The Black Lips, they write songs that their influences would be genuinely proud to call their own. Each and every song on Help is crafted with a passionate focus on the true spirit of their genre; Thee Oh Sees are more faithful dogs than copycats.

It would be ignorant and presumptuous of me to suggest Help is the album that Dwyer has always been working towards, but I will offer the opinion that it is his finest work to date. It’s been an interesting journey that Dwyer’s fans have been on with him to this point, and it’s unlikely that many would have seen this coming. Question is – is he home or just another stop along the way?

Track List:
1. Enemy Destruct
2. Ruby Go Home
3. Meat Step Lightly
4. AFlag in the Court
5. Tile Turn Around
6. Can You See?
7. Rainbow
8. Go Meet the Seed
9. I Can't Get No
10. Soda St. #1
11. Destroyed Fortress Reappears
12. Peanut Butter Oven