Lessons at Annex: Ornithology, English, Photography

Dark Room at the Annex, NYC
First we learned about birds, then we headed to the English Depratment and in the end found us developing pictures in the Dark Room - felt like going back to school on Tuesday at the Annex. Falcon presented tracks from their new CD. The guys don't talk much, Neil rather sings like a, well, y know, and his preferred topic is birds, of course, and he sure knows how to craft a beautiful tune. He could lend one to the Flaming Lips who seem to be running out of those. But the Falcon really takes off in the instrumental parts when Botanica's Christian Bongers and Longwave's Shannon Ferguson show off and push the songs to new heights. I've come to expect a lot from The English Department since there red hot show at Union pool. They have the hooks and the songs, singer David Wallace is somewhere between a young Paul Weller and a shy Billy Armstrong and his brother Justin wanders around the stage like a nerdy Flea. The band tried hard at the Annex, but the vocals just didn't cut through and had way too much reverb. Which brings us to Dark Room, in which two impressive ladies swing the strings and rock that room pretty hard. I liked the punk driven material better than the goth stuff, but that is a matter of taste. Singer JC has a great voice and a great front personality, bass player Jen is just classic, a tall Gaye Advert.