There's a particular stance that singer Molly Siegel takes when Ponytail plays live, usually at the start of their shows, where she looks ready to throw herself headlong into battle. You can see it in this clip of "Beg Waves", a song that originally surfaced on the Baltimore group's second record, Ice Cream Spiritual. Siegel stands rooted at the edge of the stage, right in the audience's faces, with her tiny frame spread as wide as it could possibly go. She'll often compound the feeling by dressing in a football shirt and daubing smudges of makeup on her cheeks. That posture works as a kind of harbinger of her subsequent response to the music, which involves a full-blooded commitment to the cause, complete with facial spasms, the spouting of a strange un-language in place of lyrics, numerous tussles with the crowd, and an unyielding physical reaction to the sound.
In some respects Siegel's visceral scuffling against the band's noise lies in marked contrast to the nature of Ponytail's music-- the word "joyous" is often invoked to describe their work, and with good reason. But that dichotomy is where Ponytail find their meaning, with guitarists Dustin Wong and Ken Seeno interlacing ray-of-light guitar lines that provide the inexorable uplift, while Siegel thrashes around like she's trying to escape from her own skin and bones. That vigor and commitment to the cause, particularly Siegel's uninhibited shredding of her self on a regular basis, must be immensely taxing. So it's perhaps unsurprising that this third Ponytail record, which bears a title that perfectly reflects their single-minded vision, comes at a time when they are on hiatus, pursuing other projects, taking a breather from such an all-consuming interest.
The opening "Easy Peasy" works in much the same way "Beg Waves" did on Ice Cream Spiritual, as a slow-build entry point into the record. It begins with a minute or two of anticipation, where the members gradually layer on each element that makes the overall sound function, almost as though they're putting an arm around your shoulder and gently ushering you into their world. But once those components are all put together-- the abstract noise, the vocal yelps, the giddily plaited guitar lines, the galloping drum patterns-- the song only devolves further into maniacal glee, where the tempo constantly stop-starts, never reaches an even meter, and ultimately races breathlessly to the finish line with a great lurch of pace at the end.
That Beefheart-like tendency to avoid consistent rhythm and keep the audience guessing is partly what makes this music feel so alive. Couple that with the natural exuberance that bleeds out of the playing, and it's hard not to get lost in the infectious indulgence of Ponytail's music. That said, there are a few changes this time out. "Flabbermouse" is less dense than most of their material, with the crosscut guitar playing kept on an even keel throughout and matched with acres of space; and Siegel's parts are more refined than before, often only amounting to a few snatched words or disappearing altogether on "Beyondersville/Flight of Fancy". The latter falls in line with the bare-bones experimentation of Wong's excellent Infinite Love album from last year, where guitar patterns are splayed out and looped over a rhythm track that never settles into a solid groove.
There's been a subtle evolution of Ponytail's approach over their three-album career, and tracks like "Beyondersville/Flight of Fancy" and the vast metallic sheets of noise that open "Music Tunes" at the close of this album keep that forward-thinking pattern firmly in place. But there's also plenty of material here to satisfy fans of their older sound. "Honey Touches" has been a staple of their live set for a while and is ostensibly the straightest track here, with Hyman guiding the band through a series of steady rhythm patterns and Siegel hinting at what's to come with her opening word: "en-er-gy." It's also one of the few Ponytail tracks where you can discern some of her lyrics. "I know it's not that fun" is the mantra that closes the song, which taps into that lopsided Ponytail ideology, where control and abandon make perfect bedfellows, and the most "fun" song on the record comes to a close with the singer claiming it's the exact opposite.
There are further deviations from the Ice Cream Spiritual aesthetic as the record progresses-- "Tush" takes a few unintelligible words from Siegel and loops them over a series of bathetic riffs; "AwayWay" returns to the wide open spaces of "Flabbermouse" before delving into that furiously exhilarating noise they are so adept at plundering. But it's in the closing "Music Tunes" that the record peaks. Here, that knotty riffing that Wong and Seeno can pile up so well is set to a long build up that, some four minutes in, takes an abrupt turn into great expanses of robo-noise, which ping back and forth and suck in another burst of that "en-er-gy" to close the record on a barely contained high. At the time of writing this review there's a message on the We Are Free website, which is layered over a picture of grunge titans Soundgarden, that reads: "Ponytail has not broken up". It's a welcome reminder of this band's current status, because one hopes that Do Whatever You Want All the Time isn't an end, but another new beginning.
