There are styles of music that I figure will probably always be around in some form, and psychedelia is one of them. I have a lot of reasons for thinking that, but the main one is that, as a genre, it's so adaptable. The advent of decent recording technology was one of the main things that made truly psychedelic music possible in the first place, so it seems natural that the music should continue to evolve with the technology. Secondly, psychedelia is at best a vaguely defined genre distinction, so it's easy to apply it to music that comes decidedly from a rock or pop standpoint, but is colored on the edges with noise and effects.
The Tadpoles pretty much exemplify what most American psychedelic music sounded like in the 1990s-- melodic rock wrapped in blankets of fuzz, heavily processed guitars and the occasional electronic studio effect. The Tadpoles were adept enough at jamming and developing themes, but they were at their best when working with concise, punchy songs. Then they broke up in 2000 ("indefinite hiatus," they called it), and leader Tom Parker pulled together this retrospective as a eulogy of sorts for the band. By and large, he's come up with a good overview of their catalog, taking four tracks from each of the band's four studio LPs, and one track from 1997's Know Your Ghosts EP.
The 78-minute disc starts where it logically should, with four songs from the band's debut album, 1994's He Fell into the Sky, and proceeds chronologically from there. As such, it gives a clear view of just how much the Hoboken, NJ band progressed during their career. "Snapper" opens things in a haze of stompbox fuzz, with Parker's tenor voice hanging low in the mix. Original drummer Michael Kite Audino lays on the toms hard, and the sheets of distortion sometimes give way to cleanly strummed guitar chords, and even something that might be described as a solo at one point (albeit not a very melodic one).
The vocals stay fairly buried and the guitar tones largely the same for the other three selections from He Fell, the best of which is probably the slow-burning "The Ride," which features some fine playing from bassist David Max and a gloriously muddy buildup near the end. The four selections from 1996's Far Out show progress almost immediately, with Nick Kramer's heavily processed guitar coming to the fore after the departure of co-guitarist Andrew Jackson.
"Race You to the Mustard Patch" drips in wah pedals and vocal effects, while the Nick Kramer-sung "Nazareth" remains squeaky-clean until about 2\xBD minutes in, when it briefly explodes in a ball of distortion and flailing lead lines. "Ride the World Around the Sun" features dueling guitars orbiting a solid bassline, while "At Least I'm Not Like Jonathan Carver" begins floating somewhere in space before congealing halfway through into a heavy, aggressive attack.
The portion of the disc devoted to 1998's excellent Smoke Ghost album is probably the most solid portion of the compilation, as the band finally hit on a combination of songwriting and sound that balanced the two equally. Kramer puts his voice out in front for "Know Your Ghosts," and the band allows for considerably more space in the arrangement, setting up some dramatic guitar breaks. "Jaded Jean" could easily have been a single, falling into the same noise-tainted pop territory that the Jesus and Mary Chain nurtured in the 80s.
Both Parker and Kramer had come a long way with their singing by this point, which allowed them not only to handle better, rangier melodies, but also gave them the confidence to put them up front in the mix, a move that greatly increases the immediacy of the songs. The only disappointing thing about this section of the disc is that Parker has chosen not to include Smoke Ghost's excellent opener "When I Feel," which is easily one of the band's best songs. Still, the propulsive, effects-drenched "Firecracker" is a reasonable substitute, if not an ideal one.
"Judas, This Is Jesus," from the Know Your Ghosts EP, follows, breaking the chronological flow for a few moments, but it's unlikely that any listener would mind, as the song doesn't sound like a step back at all. It begins with an answering machine message of a man saying, "Judas, this is Jesus. It's raining silver. Help me," a clip that reverberates over the course of the whole instrumental, which is otherwise a sticky concoction of molten guitar mayhem.
Whirlaway, the band's final album (and their only effort not recorded for their own Bakery label) had by far the clearest sound of any of their releases, incorporating more keyboards and electronics and largely eschewing the fuzz that typified their early work. Instead, the distortion on "Crash of the Bug" is more controlled and less opaque. The guitars take on more melodic tasks, too, soaring in tandem behind the verses and bridging the gaps between vocal passages. Final drummer Adam Boyette lays down a furious groove on that album's title song, giving Max the chance to toss off an impressive bass lead at one point and ably supporting the fluid guitar leads.
Unfortunately, the last two tracks each find the band gazing a little too hard at their shoes, ending the disc on a fairly unengaging note, but overall, Use with Headphones Late at Night is a satisfying look at the Tadpoles' studio career. Perhaps the most unfortunate thing about it is that it only focuses on their studio material, neglecting to include a single track from The Tadpoles Destroy Terrastock, an EP documenting their ferocious performance at the original Ptolemaic Terrascope-sponsored Terrastock festival in 1997. As far as definitive statements on what the band was capable of at their best, that EP just may be it.
Aside from that, though, there's little to gripe about. This is, in the end, a faithful overview that serves as a fine introduction to one of the great overlooked psychedelic acts of the 90s. Of course, it also catches them wandering here and there, but by and large, Use With Headphones Late at Night concentrates on the band's most focused work. For most people, this is all the Tadpoles you'll ever need. You may still want to try and catch them destroying Terrastock, though.
