When I bought two Sonna records in the fall of 2003, I had no reason to think I’d ever really fall in love with them. They were $4 apiece, used. I was working at WUAG in Greensboro, NC and had played Sonna a few times on my radio show. The musicianship seemed scattershot– music to write to and forget. In fact, I really only listened to them that fall. The records themselves sat on my shelves (reverse alphabetical order; next to Seam and Sebadoh) for a good four years before my rediscovery of We Sing Loud Sing Soft Tonight.
It was a true NYC winter in 2009. Those who know winter walking know how snowy weather compounds walking. They know how snow means more walking, harder walking. It means tricky slopes and steps, ice spots and huge hills of piled-up black snow along walkable parts of the sidewalk and street. It means constant vigilance. Once you get home, the bottoms of your jeans freezing cold and wet, it meant relaxing in the warmth. I went on a record exploration during those cozy nights. I was working on my first book and decided to break out the instrumental jams of a few years ago. When I ran across Sonna I furrowed my brow. They were exactly what I needed, but I couldn’t remember even buying the records.
On the first snare hits of “Opener,” I remembered the entire album. I love that feeling. That “Oh yeah” expression you realize you have as the warm melodies collapse around you. So much of Sonna’s work collapses on you rather than building around you, it seems. For the whole first side of the record (”Opener,” “Low and To the Side,” and We Sing Loud”) I sat transfixed, legs folded over one another, nodding. When Chris Mackie sang me out of my reveries with a harsh, off-key falsetto, I wasn’t upset by it. The repetition, the prettiness, and the sweeping nothingness of the album needed him. He breaks the album in half– there’s the opening coldness followed by his gusts of wind. “We Sing Loud” is a passing whimsy, “Sing Soft Tonight” is a defeating drag. Either way, the songs are long, masterfully decorated post-rock remnants. They earmark a time when we thought this would be the next big thing, that maybe “our music” would affect the world. Instead, post-rock is signified by bands at the mercy construction, playing to appreciative small crowds. So it was and so it still is with very few exceptions.
“Sleep On It” is a show poster on the wall: a blank space underneath album art for a club to put their names and the local openers. Sonna is that local opener, that friend’s band you finally went to see after you missed the first few shows. “Sleep On It” dictates your movement. You want to go to the bathroom, but you can’t leave the song for more than a moment. I was unable to change from my winter-soiled clothes. I sat on the couch, TV on mute and unwatched, the walls of my apartment rattling with minimal low end. We blasted a lot of music in that Astoria apartment, but I am not sure I ever played anything so loud. “Sleep On It” presses into you with an opening riff spiraling upward to an apex marked by lively additions: an occasional bass drawl, harmonius ring-outs and then, at the point you might get bored, the song shifts definitively. “Sleep On It” brings drums and a new riff. The relative distance of that upward spiral crashes into the listener as a defiant, triumphant roar. Not the kind of expansive roar other bands cheaply get with distortion or with extra instrumentation, no, Sonna earns their ending. You may have come to see the band featured on the poster, but you will remember that they were bested that night. You might even steal the poster from the door to remember Sonna’s name.
“Real Quiet” closes the album on an upbeat note. Rolling drums lead a quaint, simple riff. In a way, “Real Quiet” barely belongs on the album. If not for the production, this song would be quite un-Sonna. At under 5 minutes, the song is gone in a flash. The bass is lively, at least in comparison to the rest of the album, and the riffs interchange with one another for control of your ear. Unlike the other songs, there’s nowhere to go and that’s fine. Necessity can be the enemy of the instrumental song. So “Real Quiet” builds a bit and ends with a “bigger” sound than the others. In a way, Sonna is reminding the listener how easy it is for them to manipulate sound. Instead of lamenting misplaced beefiness, they end with all the power they possess for We Sing Loud Sing Soft Tonight.
Now it’s 2012, I’m driving around instead of walking so much, and there was no winter to of which to speak as of mid-February. Some gracious souls forgot to throw the Sonna records out when I visited my old job upon returning to WUAG-Greensboro. I was back in North Carolina to live. The record store I’d bought Sonna in had closed, no one had them for download online and I was broke. All my records were in boxes, yet to be moved from NYC. If not for the radio station, Sonna may have been lost again. I ripped the entire catalog (two albums, two EPs). Those who know the drive through Virginia on I-85 know the monotony, the tediousness of towering trees as far as you can see. But what they don’t know is monotony can be beautiful. As tough as it is to stay awake, it’s easier to sleepwalk. As hard as it is to walk through snow, it’s easier to sit and marvel. It’s these times, I turn to Sonna. In 2005, I didn’t know what I had. The same can be said for now, only I’ve collected some artifacts along the way. We Sing Loud Sing Soft Tonight often finds me lost and gathers me found.
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