The Sea and Cake create poppy post-rock record

The Sea and Cake's eighth album is a phenomenal effort despite quick production.

By Tom Carbone

Published Oct. 24, 2008

To fully understand the simple beauty of Car Alarm, The Sea and Cake's eighth full-length album in fewer than 15 years, you have to understand the story behind the band and the process it took to create this record.

After Shrimp Boat, a post-rock band out of Chicago, disbanded back in 1993, founders Eric Claridge and Sam Prekop reunited and formed The Sea and Cake, a play on words that stems from a song by Gastor de Sol called "The C in Cake." After releasing its experimental self-titled debut in 1994, the band quickly followed up with Nassau and The Biz in succession in 1995. Throughout the next 13 years, both Prekop and Claridge worked on various solo projects including Claridge's endeavors as a painter and Prekop's solo release on Thrill Jockey Records.

In the wake of its 2003 release One Bedroom, the band followed its trend of taking long breaks between albums by spending four years on Everybody. After finishing the album, the band departed from its usual process and immediately starting recording the follow-up, Car Alarm, after an Australian tour the guys took back in March.

Car Alarm, released on Oct. 21, seems at first to be a rushed album created on the heels of a huge tour, but multiple listens reveal a whole new side of The Sea and Cake it hasn't shown on previous releases. The band claims to have created Car Alarm as a sort of continuation of Everybody - and it shows. Tightened, jazzy, post-rock riffs combined with simplistic drums lead the listener to believe that it really is just Everybody part two.

Car Alarm starts out on an upbeat note with "Aerial," a swirling pop tune with heavily affected guitars and a definite post-rock vibe that introduces a progression heard throughout the remainder of the album.

While the first three songs continue on this path, "CMS Sequence" is an instrumental electronic tune that immediately brings MIDI video game music to mind. It's an interesting shift of sound, but the title track brings the record back on course right away.

With Everybody, The Sea and Cake created an album that was perfect to listen to while driving around in a car during the summertime, but Car Alarm is a stark contrast - at least in the sense of seasonal inspirations. Car Alarm's intelligent sound and crisp delivery have more of a brisk fall-time feel to it, something that the band hasn't shown in previous efforts.

"Window Sills" is a perfect example of this sound. The straightforward yet melodious verses and chorus make for easy listening, and the band is able to maintain this vibe despite a killer guitar solo about 50 seconds in. Plain and simple, this song, along with others on the album, is great to listen to right now because of the energy and melodies the band incorporates into it and most of the album.

The Sea and Cake have created a killer fall-time soundtrack with Car Alarm, a poppy post-rock blend that only The Sea and Cake can produce. Car Alarm is a phenomenal effort considering the amount of time in which it was created.