You've gotta be either supremely confident in your masculinity or packing some serious Coke-bottle glasses to call your five-piece, all-dude rock band ... Librarians. Take a gander at these guys live and I think you'll agree it must be some combination of the two.
Perhaps they just do things a little differently down in Morgantown, W.Va., where the band's brainy yet serrated dance-rock first emerged from a maze of WVU friendships (and benders, no doubt), in 2004. Following up a self-released EP, Neo-Rodeo, the band's just put out its debut full-length, Alright Easy Candy Stranger.
On swaggering tracks such as "Secret Sugar Lip" and "Smoke and Mirrors," you hear occasional similarities to experimental dance-punk acts Liars, Les Savy Fav and Enon. Appropriately enough for such influences, this debut came out on tiny D.C. indie Postfact Records, which also recently released Dawn of Man's In the Bronze Age, produced by David Sitek (TV on the Radio, Yeah Yeah Yeahs).
"Right On," a burbling synth arpeggio kicks into a brooding booty-stomp, while vocal harmonies "scratch that itch" and pointy guitars hit all the dissonant, nightmare notes. Some say this kind of sound's a bit kicked at this date, but especially live, it's hard to refuse a band that confidently balances pleasure and paranoia, dorkdom and glamour.
Librarians with Chad Sipes Stereo. 9 p.m. Sat., Dec. 23. Thunderbird Café, 4023 Butler St., Lawrenceville. $5. 412-682-0177 or www.thunderbirdcafe.net
Gimme somethin' to write on: Librarians
