Rock and roll bands don't come much simpler than Maritime. With just a couple of clean guitars, a bass, and a really tight drummer laying the background for a clear voice, there's nothing that gets in the way of its frighteningly catchy songs. But that benign simplicity belies a real earnestness to tell some darker stories. Beneath the rhythmic guitar strumming and frenetic drumming there's always a lyric or two that hints at something deeper. Take the pair of songs "Peril" and "Pearl." Telling two sides of a story the pair twist each other's phrases. The droning "Peril" offers, "We begin with sages and the onion skin/Heartbeat backs the first bite and the original sin/All our lives in peril/All our lives in stone," while the more upbeat sounding "Pearl" counters with, "We begin with singletons, sages, and the onion skin on/Those of heartbeat back the buried sunshine/All our lives in pearls/All our afternoons sitting on setting suns." The only problem is that sometimes the scant ornamentation and slim vocal harmonies can make Maritime's songs sound a bit too similar. In fact, it took a couple listens through the album to realize that "Peril" and "Pearl" were actually supposed to sound like each other. Still, for a band that's managed to release a remarkably cogent trio of albums in just four years, keeping it simple seems to be working just fine.
-- Sander Wolf
