Send "Imperial Teen " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Spin |
 One of alt-rock's most beloved, underrated bands flash their still-unique sparkSpin Rating 8 of 10 "With a foot on the ground / I can turn it around / Warming up to the sound / And I'm not coming down," croons Imperial Teen masse over a percolating keyboard riff on their splendid new album, sounding like a veteran quartet with nothing to prove, but still hellbent on proving it anyway. Keeping the alternative-rock fires burning well into adulthood is an enduring conundrum, especially for bands cheeky enough to adopt an adolescent name. But Sonic Youth and Teenage Fanclub still pull it off, and so does this Bay Area crew on Feel the Sound, their first release since 2007. Emphatically so. One trick is to take your time. This is just the fizzy Bay Area indie-pop ensemble's fifth studio album in a career old enough to drive in most states, and the subject matter is as grown-up as you'd expect. It's tempting to interpret the anxiousness invoked here as the manifestation of a midlife crisis, especially in light of the Teen's last album, The Hair the TV the Baby and the Band, whose title called out each member's extracurricular pursuits: bassist Jone Stebbins' hair salon, keyboardist/guitarist Roddy Bottum's film and TV soundtrack work, drummer Lynn Perko Truell's offspring, and keyboardist/guitarist Will Schwartz's side band, Hey Willpower. That album's most telling song was "Room With a View," set in the rehearsal space of a band struggling to cope with unsympathetic neighbors while vowing to "do our best to pretend we'll be 20 for life." Feel the Sound does no such pretending, but Imperial Teen still sound as fresh and vital as ever. The band always has radiated an adorable eagerness, which infused even their cattiest barbs with sly wit packaged in chewy pop goodness. But a lot more of those barbs are inward-directed nowadays ("The music's stopped and I can't sing / But I can get through anything," goes the closing verse of "Last to Know"), couched in manic arrangements that exude a sense of the band members feeling dazed and overwhelmed. Song titles include "Over His Head," "Don't Know How You Do It," and "Overtaken," all rendered in their respective choruses with the greatest of deadpan ease with lovely male-female harmony-vocal chants....full text |
| Popmatters |
| Some indie rock bands want to make a serious artistic statement. Think Animal Collective, Arcade Fire, maybe Grizzly Bear, and the Antlers and go on from there. Then there are indie pop acts who just want to make something that’s fun and bubbly. Into that category you can throw Imperial Teen, originally based in San Francisco but whose members have spread out across the continental United States. Their fifth full-length, and first in five years, Feel the Sound is categorically a bubblegum pop album, which is a bit of a marked change from their last outing, 2007’s The Hair the TV the Baby and the Band, which was more a belly-gazing, “Hey, we’re all in our 40s now and we’re ironically called Imperial Teen!” kind of record. Feel the Sound, conversely, aspires to be nothing more than the kind of disc you can throw on in the background at a hip retro chic party and just awash yourself in with its bouncy keyboards - courtesy of Roddy Bottum, ex of Faith No More. In that sense, Feel the Sound is just another indie pop record, albeit not a bad one. Its mission statement is simply to have purchasers go out and have a good time with it. Sometimes you need that. However, if you’re looking for something deep and profound with Feel the Sound, you’re going to be disappointed. Merriweather Post Pavilion this ain’t. Again, not necessary a bad thing—it’s just that there isn’t really a narrative arc to hold onto here. In fact, the band pronounces this very fact on the very first track and lead-off single, “Runaway”, in which all four band members (two guys, two girls) all share lead vocal duties. “So much for subtlety,” it goes, and while the group also adds the line “make tomorrow today again” in “Runaway”, the truth of the matter is that Imperial Teen is actually all about making yesterday today again. There’s a very ELO-styled Mellotron used in “Runaway” for starters, and, elsewhere on the album, the band is keen on reviving the sounds of ‘70s-styled German electronic rock. This is most notable on the fifth song “Hanging About”, which travels along in a very straight line in a slick and well varnished sheen, the sort of thing that a car commercial would be filmed against. “No Matter What You Say” is a bright and punchy keyboard-led ditty that, too, would be the sort of thing that you can close your eyes to and see a bunch of Volkswagens zooming about to. While Bottum has scored some films in recent years, you get the idea from Feel the Sound that the group might be setting their sights on landing some TV work. Again, this is hardly a bad thing, but the band’s sterling ambition sort of hits you on the head with a very audible “bonk!”....full text |
| Prefixmag |
| When Merge Records celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2009, which band do you think closed the fourth and final night of shows at Chapel Hill, North Carolina's Cat's Cradle? It wasn't Arcade Fire (they weren't even there) or She & Him (they headlined a show on UNC's campus the next night) or Conor Oberst or Superchunk of Spoon (the previous nights' closers). Nope, in the end, the celebration at the classic indie rock venue from the classic indie rock label closed with an infectious set from Imperial Teen. The band is both an obvious and strange choice, since Imperial Teen has a devoted but also decidedly limited fan base. But what makes them perfect is that they are exactly the kind of unpretentious power-pop group that represents what Merge Records is (and what modern pop music should be) all about. The set was a show-stopper, confirming that the direct, sweet power of their records comes on only stronger on the stage. Now, two-plus years later, the band is back with their fifth full length (and third for Merge), Feel the Sound, and it continues their run of infectious and distinct pop tunes. The foursome, now together over 16 years, has always understood their strengths, but they have refined them over the course of their career. Following the graceful aging of 2007's The Hair, The TV, The Baby & The Band, Feel the Sound is an unabashedly glossy and sleek pop record. The album opens with all four players -- Roddy Bottum, Lynn Perko Truell, Will Schwartz, and Jone Stebbins -- singing lead single "Runaway" in unison, and it's a knockout punch right at the bell. It's an early bid for Perfect Pop Song of 2012, with a hell of an earworm chorus and sweetly slick hooks throughout....full text |
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