The Dreadful Yawns – S/T / 2005 Bomp! / 14 Tracks / http://www.dreadfulyawns.com / http://www.bomp.com / Reviewed 23 September 2005

The amount of country in which The Dreadful Yawns infuse the first track of their CD, “You Sold the Farm” is enough to make this track worthy for GAC. The sound does contain enough of an alternative bent to give listeners a little hesitance before slapping the oft-maligned country tag on the band, and the follow-up track (“Get Yourself Back Home”) shifts the band’s sound enough (opting for a Delta-blues sound) to really make the band difficult to pigeonhole.

The brilliant thing about The Dreadful Yawns is that their easy acceptance of such a down-home sound eliminates those status-seeking individuals who just MUST have the latest “flavor of the week”. What is left are true fans that can see the brilliance in the humor of the slide-heavy “Darkness Is Gone”. The bluegrass-influenced guitar solo that acts as a bridge between the two sections of the song is reminiscent of some of the earlier masters of the genre (individuals like Flatt and Scruggs). The Dreadful Yawns actually break out of the country style for a more traditional, dream-pop track in “It’s A Charmed Life”. The track is the perfect continuance of a shifting set of styles that really provide the main reason to continue listening to the disc. When a band is able to approach a number of styles so successfully and without having any of the tracks sounding too far out there, what results is a solid disc that might just have the widest listener base. While each of the tracks on the disc had a certain charm surrounding them, it is perhaps during “Better Things To Do” that the band hits pay dirt.

While the track is similar in sound to “It’s A Charmed Life” (the same style of dreamy-pop), there is a guitar construct, an arrangement that quickly goes up and down the scales while burrowing its sweet sound into a listener’s head forever. Almost of equal talent to the aforementioned guitar line is the bluegrass bass played at the onset of “Drinking Song”, another foray by The Dreadful Yawns into the Country & Western genre. The incorporation of what sounds like a Spanish/Mexican style of guitar playing seems to give the track a fresh sound that is welcomed at the late stage of the disc. The Dreadful Yawns do not at any time on this disc cause the malady that their band name refers to; what results is a solid disc that never fails to surprise.

Top Tracks: Drinking Song, You Sold The Farm

Rating: 7.2/10