I was doing dishes to the sounds of Orthrelm at my girlfriend's apartment the other day; she came into the room after a hard day of designing crashpads, and asked if we could listen to something softer like, maybe, Wolf Eyes. I misheard, thought she wanted to know if I was listening to Wolf Eyes: "No, this is Orthrelm." She responded: "I know, I have a headache, can we listen to something else?" I dried my hands of it, and turned off those cloven gods of the dogged riff.
This is common domestic drama and you could just as easily switch some variables in the story around. Let's say I'm removing the caked-on grease of coconut tofu cheesecake while playing Lightning Bolt, The Fuckers, or Pink and Brown. I guess Orthrelm's more metal, which fit my mood at the time. Those indie-rock superstars in Lightning Bolt are less rock, more noise. I'd like to keep things of-the-now and The Fuckers broke up ages ago (I only own one of their singles anyway) so fuck that. Of the four options-- just one of a million noisy duos-- Pink and Brown is the most straightforward Rock. Pink uses a duct-taped throat microphone and a single guitar, Brown does drums; they sound like John Spencer might if someone lowered his voice in the mix and kicked him in the stomach during any of his cribbed solos, then proceeded to shave his head.
During the band's vaguely chaotic three-year existence they only managed to drop a single full length, 2001's Final Foods on Toyo Records, and a 12" split with Death Drug on Load in 2002. This could be because they live in separate cities within the golden state: Dwyer in San Francisco and Rosenberg in Los Angeles. Maybe they couldn't deal with the different sensibilities rampant in either overdetermined geography? The tiny output could equally be attributed to their million other projects: John Dwyer's most notably a key player in the Coachwhips and Zeigenbock Kopf (wearing mustaches and acting German with Aaron Aites of Iran) and Jeff Rosenberg plays in the Young People.
So what's their deal? If you mention Pink and Brown, chances are some smarmy someone will mention the band's outfits. The colors pink and brown go together nicely. It's a good aesthetic with a fine political undertone referencing Thomas Sowell's 1977 essay "Pink and Brown People", which dealt with the polarizing inaccuracies of language used to describe different races. If you want to fixate there, the coolest thing about the outfits is the fake beard sometimes worn by Pink. Though the two already come wrapped in vaguely creepy masks and body suits, Pink for some reason attaches a Walt Whitman looking slab of fluff to the outside of his ski-mask: the artifice is ridiculously apparent, but admirably so. What is it with these duos and uniforms? But come on: they could've only gotten so far if all they had were the tights.
Whatever your take, the fairly new 22-track opus, Shame Fantasy II, is a complete discography plus five new songs recorded on New Year's Day 2003 by Dave Brokema of Numbers (There's also a Shame Fantasy II LP, which only has the new live tracks). I have never heard so much Pink and Brown in one sitting; while I admire steadfastness, the sporadic lack of differentiation made me antsy after a while, sometimes undoing the listening session. Because their attack is pretty even tempered and there are no explanatory liner notes provides, you're forced to differentiate time periods within the oeuvre by judging sound qualities and recording set-ups: I won't give these answers away, pretend this is Musician magazine and give those lazy ears of yours a test.
The album opens with "Black Pearl"-- slightly over a minute of spiraling rock-- zoning out on a Tim Green project filtered through a fan, and ends with "The Tunnel", a vacuum-packed two minute decomposition of guitar rock in a miasmatic sinkhole; it shoves off via a pretty little breakdown part: rat-a-tat and puffs of distorted smoke floating out to sea. The twenty tracks between mix-up these modalities, adding spaced-out portions of noise ruminations, chipped-away drum solos, upfront salivation, tuneful interludes, pitch-perfect handstands, entropic staying patterns, and layers upon layers of caustic interpolations. By and large, the shit rocks.
Maybe you'll like it, maybe you'll hate it, but at least it's all available in one easy document so you can swallow the crust and decide for yourself if there's more to these two than the suave outfits. Or if you should file under "one trick pony," along with any number of uninspired independent hacks. I loudly lodge a vote for the former.
