Imperial Teen

Few bands these days have a dynamic, a musical bond between strong personalities. Imperial Teen are one of those bands, and their dynamic is unique. Roddy Bottum, Lynn Perko, Will Schwartz and Jone Stebbins combine differences and blur boundariesfriendship/love, male/femaleto create the sound of life turned up to 10. The songs on What Is Not To Love turn each twist of fate into a simple pop joy. But the more you listen, the more you learn complicated lessons in lust and loss.

To borrow a line from their acclaimed 1996 debut, Seasick, Imperial Teen’s subtext is their plot. Fall beneath the surface of What Is Not To Love’s elliptical, imagistic lyrics and you’ll catch traces of dramas within the band, as well as between the band and its friends and fans. Imperial Teen are as likely to cast each other (and their bandmates and family) as characters as they are to sing about themselves. But the particular stories and people behind What Is Not To Love’s songs aren’t as important as the experiences the songs expose.

The bubblegrunge of Seasick has blossomedvia seductive whispers; harmonies swallowed by screams; guitars and back-up vocals that go “Wow”into a dark, expansive love-at-first-hear beauty that is Imperial Teen’s own. Take “Yoo Hoo,” What Is Not To Love’s first single. The song updates the sexy-scary sonic spirit of T. Rex and the Stones with an intuitive rhythmic-harmonic inventiveness that rivals Timbaland’s current radio-ruling R&B. Drawn in by the song’s spine-tingling, subconscious hooks, you’ll find yourself singing along with a stalker.

Whether writing about men or about women, Imperial Teen defy safe societal roles and song-writing rules. Mixing compassion and detachment, identification and isolation, the portraits that result are open-minded, open-hearted, open-ended: alive. The intimate empathy of “Lipstick” punctures a female icon’s pride and prejudiceit’s one of two flipsides to “Yoo Hoo”‘s musical bond gone bad. The other, “Birthday Girl,” is a misfit anthem that deserves mass popularity: translating distortion into emotion, it has the courage to use the uncool personal pronoun “we,” and the honesty to use it to assert independence.

Elsewhere, What Is Not To Love applies original perspectives to psychedelic motifs. Instead of pharmaceuticals, “Crucible” is drugged by the chemicals of a body in transition. “Alone in the Grass” finds eternity in an instant, and the universe in a small patch of nature, but it isn’t peacefulas words and thoughts materialize and disappear, the music ricochets from silence to violence.

The ambiguous sexuality that electrifies Imperial Teen’s songs isn’t glam fashion; it’s true to the conflicting desires each body, and each day, contains. Altering voices from song to song to explore aspects of personality, Imperial Teen are still uninhibited and unpredictable. What Is Not To Love articulates innocence and wisdom, stopping at the precise moment both are shattered.

It’s the greatest kind of ironya tough, real onethat an album called What Is Not To Love contains so many forms of love, all of them imperfect and exciting. Imperial Teen have made a guide for people who hate guides. The supply the cryptic codes of conduct, but the gaps that separate and surround each soundthose are spaces for you to fill.