Bilge Rat.
On “Dissolvi,” the final cut on Bilge Rat’s Pal, the band’s three members — Mike Kusek on guitar and vocals, Quinn Pirie on drums, and Michael Hammond on bass — come in together, Pirie’s rhythm leaving plenty of space for a plaintive guitar line. Then, a bar later and without warning, the band switches to a full-on roar that’s gone as soon as it starts, and comes back again. Over the course of the song, Kusek’s own vocals do the same, going from a whisper to a yowl in one line and back again.
“Dissolvi” captures the vibe of all of Pal, a dynamic, unsettling album that feels less anxious than cathartic. Beneath the New Haven-based band’s gloom, there’s a brain on fire, loud heartbeat.
It all gets underway in Pal’s first song, “Cupio,” which spikes its atmospheric verses with bursts of distortion before picking up momentum in its second half to work itself into a guitar-fueled churn. “Quinn’s Lament” finds the band navigating a series of angular melodies and rhythmic stops and starts with ease before unleashing a melody as pretty in its note choices as it is rough in its texture. “Baby Blue” pours on the sludge, but not without a compellingly rattling percussion part on the verses, while “Slacker” finds the band at its most expansive.
It’s worth mentioning that these songs are kind of hard to play. The melodies aren’t straightforward, the harmonic structures not obvious. The songs feature a lot of sharp stops, twists and turns, sudden changes in unexpected places. All of this helps make Bilge Rat’s music quite compelling, and the band’s live shows — Bilge Rat plays pretty regularly on the New Haven scene — prove that the musicians are up to the challenges they’ve set for themselves to create the music they want.
If Pal wasn’t recorded live, it sure feels like it in the best sense. The sound of the album is that of three musicians playing together in a room, feeling it out, making it all work. The music breathes, lurches, and heaves in a fully organic way, making what could sound like a cerebral workout into an emotional experience. And those emotions are complicated. Pal doesn’t offer any easy answers, but it poses plenty of questions. As long as Kusek, Pirie, and Hammond keep making such searching, thrilling music, let’s hope they keep asking.