Baby Calendar
Gingerbread Dog
Happy Happy Birthday To Me Records

In another five to 10 years, the jagged guitar hooks, booming drums, piercing synthesizers and almost unbearably sweet boy/girl vocals that mark the third CD by Miami-based trio, Baby Calendar, could strike a lovely note of nostalgia or might sound new to the ears of music fans. Right now, the group’s sound comes off as a well-worn retread of the already established work of bands such as Rainer Maria and Mates of State. Baby Calendar’s stuff may be working towards more poppier aims than those two groups, but the precedent has been set and it’s can hardly be denied by anyone who has payed attention to indie music for the last 10 years or so.

This isn’t to say that this disc isn’t without its charms. The beauty of a good pop hook never gets old and this band is absolutely overflowing with them. As well, the interplay of the bass and guitar, weaving around each other and playing off of each other’s lines is a lovely counterpoint to the vocal work of Tom Gorrio and Jackie Biver who don’t really harmonize on all the songs here, but know how to sing together and make the other sound even better than they might on their own.

It is what gets put on top of all the great hooks and delicious vocal work that takes so much away from the record. There’s the overuse of a rather whiny synthesizer on two-thirds of the songs, the needlessly wordy lyrics that talk a lot but don’t seem to really say much at all, and the rather busy arrangements that take the songs through unneeded twists and turns when a simple straightforward groove might be more appropriate. On top of all this, it seems like the band never knows when to quit. The songs, like the lyrics, meander along and don’t give you a feeling of any kind of payoff as well as not giving you anything to really remember them by the end of the disc.

Again, this band has all the makings of something special, but you get the impression that they aren’t quite there yet. They sound like they are working out their own sound but might need more time to bang things into shape. They’ve gotten their name out there. Now it’s time to make that name actually stand out in the crowd.

Website
Baby Calendar website