They're not a pity case, but Q & Not U have definitely had their share of shake-ups. First, bassist Matt Borlik petered out shortly after 2000's debut No Kill No Beep Beep, forcing D.C.'s great new punk band into an infinitely more limited guitar/guitar/drum configuration. As it happens, the Chinese character for "crisis" means both "danger" and "opportunity," and Q & Not U strong-armed this potential setback into a chance for growth. Guitarist/frontmen Chris Richards and Harris Klahr re-centered the band's dynamics, keeping the strings high and shooting the vocals up into the falsetto range, drummer John Davis traded brute Dischord energy for smaller, cleaner fills, and by 2002's sophomore follow-up Different Damage, Q & Not U relied more noticeably on melody to foot the bill for their high-octane rock numbers.
In Spring 2003, Davis hurt his right foot-- his kickdrum foot-- playing hockey. So Q & Not U essentially lost what remained of their rhythm section, and were forced to cancel the remainder of their tour while Davis recovered. Fortunately, drummers tend to tough it out when shit goes horribly wrong (e.g. Rick Allen's missing arm or Keith Moon's broken body), and Davis took up the task of adapting his playing style to sidestep his critical injury. He healed enough to command the pointedly drum-heavy X-Polynation EP in late 2003, but a year later, something stuck from his days with his kick in a cast.
On Power, Davis lays way back in the cut, keeping the math-rock runs to single digits and on some tracks sitting out entirely. So the "new" Q & Not U hardly sounds like a baby Fugazi-- they've different-damaged Different Damage, trading up its last few yelps for some supremely delicate melodies and dangerously nude a cappella falsetto. Power is, to say the least, hardly the collection of hard rockers that No Kill and Different Damage were. But with its lilt melodies, Davis' downplayed role, and the band's admission that, hey, a bassline here or there couldn't hurt, Power boasts a cohesion and distinct identity missing from Q & Not U's two previous albums.
Like "Soft Pyramids" does for Different Damage, "Wonderful People" lays out the extent of Q & Not U's new musical agenda. Melodies will keep their color, drums will switch the TI-83 herky-jerks with sliderule austere, and fat synthesized basslines will slink under chicken-scratch guitars and brilliant hooks ("Water softly running, running" is an early highlight). Richards and Klahr's pasty-funk falsetto keeps the song fun and buoyant, and the extra room in the mix lets the band's straight-ahead thump blight the bright lights.
Perhaps Q & Not U rely on the falsetto a little too heavily on Power but the squeaks are never purely decorative. The band has written some vocal lines here that sound straight out of church hymnals and medieval palace song books-- they're uncompromisingly childlike at times-- and the tension birthed from grown men singing beyond their range grants the tunes a new and compelling lease. "Collect the Diamonds" struggles at first (the line, "This could be serious/ It could be so deadly, deadly serious," makes me vomit), but then settles into the album's best call-and-response chorus. "Throw Back Your Head" is wholly successful, with wood flutes and an octaved melody filling out the song's space, while "District Night Prayer" opts for three parts and packs a kitschy spookout similar to Vince Guaraldi's "Christmas Time Is Here".
Which is not to say that Power is a strictly regal affair; Q & Not U manages to nice up the dance here, too. "Beautiful Beats" morphs into a drum machine romp with huge synths, catcalls, and guitar clicks pinched from Archie Bell & The Drells' "Tighten Up". "Wet Work" fronts an edgy guitar lead that's undermined by Davis' snare clicks and a silly synthbass squelch. At its end, the song breaks down with a soulful snare-on-one homage to Sly & The Family Stone's "Dance to the Music", skipping the dance-punk tropes and heading straight into cold-blooded funk.
Power proves Q & Not U's malleability, but perhaps just as importantly, assures they're still capable of that Dischord rock energy that defined their debut: No crowd would ever let Q & Not U finish a show without playing "A Line in the Sand". The album's closing suite (the rabid "X-Polynation", the tattered space-laser funk on "Book Of Flags", and the mercilessly monochrome "Tag-Tag") stands as a monument to the band's homegrown post-punk predisposition. Q & Not U is increasingly supple on Power, but hardly nomadic.
