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Roy

Tacomatose (2003)
Initial Records

Reviewer Rating:

Contributed by: Scott
(others by this writer | submit your own)

Published on August 5th 2003

Roy is going to get billed by most everyone as "ex-suchandsuch," as the band is a bit of a supergroup, at least in the Northwestern scene. Roy features former Botch members Dave Verellen and Brian Cook [who is currently splitting time in These Arms Are Snakes], as well as Dave's brother Ben [who is the frontman of sludge-garage-rock band Harkonen]. Now Botch is virtually legendary up in the left hand corner of the US, and the other two bands mentioned are currently building a bit of buzz individually, so hearing what the members of this band moonlight[ed] in will definitely perk up some ears.

Wow, this review reminds me so much of my Onalaska review from a few months back it's ridiculous.

Anyway. Roy sounds nothing like Botch, so don't expect to see some crazy hardcore stuff going on in these 5 tracks. Roy is instead more akin to a lot of the late 80s/early 90s alt-rock movement [for a complete list of influences, see Our Band Could Be Your Life]. Roy's sound is simply this - grungy yet poppy rock songs that bring to mind the Pixies more than anything else [especially the "Where Is My Mind?" ripoff of "The Bolivian Army Lays Siege To Seattle"].

So the music's not revolutionary, but the lyrics are incredibly introspective and personal. A good portion of this disc seems to be about Verellen's friends' drug addictions. Sure, it's sung rather sardonically, but I still believe every word that falls out of his mouth in a classic Northwestern drawl [reminding me of Doug Marsch, just lower pitched].

So as I mentioned before, don't go into this record expecting the musical history of these guys to repeat itself. It all pretty much boils down to this - if you're still into Mudhoney and treasure your original Sub Pop singles collection, pick this up.

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Anonymous (August 8, 2003)

You guys are fucking retarded if you think These Arms Are Snakes and Botch were emo bands...I find it funny how it's cool to like Against Me and not Roy, they both have heavy folk influences but I guess Against Me is is the "punker" of the two...

Anonymous (August 7, 2003)

Roy - Tacomatose
Posted by Anonymous on 2003-08-05 12:31:06
My Score:
--------------------------------------------------------------- -----------------

Am I the only one who thinks these guys completely blow?

They sound like they got kicked out of their emo bands, bought Left & Leaving, and proceeded to use their former band status to put out records and tour.

This shit is boring.

Me too.

Anonymous (August 7, 2003)

the first four letters are t-a-c-o.

hungryjoe (August 5, 2003)

Thank god somebody got it.

Anonymous (August 5, 2003)

We like roy! we like roy!

Anonymous (August 5, 2003)

Scott: not unless they are french canadian.

Anonymous (August 5, 2003)

Am I the only one who thinks these guys completely blow?

They sound like they got kicked out of their emo bands, bought Left & Leaving, and proceeded to use their former band status to put out records and tour.

This shit is boring.

KirbyPuckett (August 5, 2003)

Does this have anything to do with Patrick Roy?

- Scott
http://www.local-felons.com/
(I'm rockin' the suburbs)

travis (August 5, 2003)

theyre from tacoma. and theyre touring with the weakerthans in september. yiu cant get better than that.

Anonymous (August 5, 2003)

I bought their older(?) EP at the Blood Brothers/These Arms Are Snakes show and I love it...can't find this so I'm wondering it it has any of the same songs as the EP I bought or if I should try to find this through mailorder. Love the band, I'd say they are like Against Me with a heavy indie rock influence.

hungryjoe (August 5, 2003)

now just the seniors in the back...