<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Songs don\u2019t have a tendency to terrify me, but one in particular creeps a chill down my spine every time I hear it. It\u2019s called the \u201cSubway Song,\u201d off The Cure\u2019s album Boy\u2019s Don\u2019t Cry, and it details the plight of a woman coming home on the subway after midnight. \u201cEchoes of footsteps\/ Follow close behind\/ But she dare not turn around\u201d sings Robert Smith in the way only Robert Smith can. The bass line lingers then stops for a brief pause, giving way to a monstrous scream.<\/p>\n
Bothers me every time I hear it.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m gonna have to guess Louis Vasquez knows that song rather well. The sole member of San Francisco\u2019s The Soft Moon, Vasquez\u2019 self-titled debut album mirrors The Cure, digging into a Gothic past and emerging with slick atmospheric grooves and sullen, glimmering synths. It also scared the shit out of me \u2014 leaving me edgier than Charlie Sheen in a room full of cocaine. Granted, everyone is edgy in a roomful of cocaine, but you get the idea.<\/p>\n
The opening track \u201cBreathe the Fire\u201d enters in media res, with a feel as if you\u2019re being chased like wild game. The ominous bass line is topped by Vasquez\u2019 icy lyrics, which never rise above a cautious whisper. It gives way to the agitated \u201cCircles,\u201d a whirling loop of yelps and cries. I imagined myself being stuck in a tunnel while cars with blinding lights raced at me from every direction.<\/p>\n
Yeah, I was losing it.<\/p>\n
Vasquez saved me from despair with the rhythmic \u201cWhen it\u2019s Over,\u201d which wasn\u2019t exactly a merry track (the moans didn\u2019t come across gleeful), but I didn\u2019t see the need to keep looking over my shoulder. But \u201cWhen it\u2019s Over\u201d was, Vasquez ramped up the tension again with \u201cDead Love,\u201d and maintained the pressure until the final note of \u201cTiny Spiders\u201d screamed into silence.<\/p>\n
In between lurk songs modern horror movies would die for (sorry, I\u2019m adding levity so as not to crumble). \u201cParallels\u201d groans and gurgles like a drowning man, and the aptly-named \u201cSewer Sickness\u201d is an onslaught of high-pitched synths and bass reverb. I don\u2019t even want to talk about \u201cPrimal Eyes,\u201d OK? Cause it\u2019s not OK, man, it\u2019s just not.<\/p>\n
There is genius in Vasquez\u2019 bleak world, but it\u2019s a frightening place to be. The Soft Moon is a taut, thin wire over a deep canyon of pain \u2014 and as long as you keep going forward, you\u2019ll be satisfied when it\u2019s over.<\/p>\n
Just dare not turn around.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Songs don\u2019t have a tendency to terrify me, but one in particular creeps a chill down my spine every time I hear it. It\u2019s called the \u201cSubway Song,\u201d off The Cure\u2019s album Boy\u2019s Don\u2019t Cry, and it details the plight of a woman coming home on the subway after midnight. \u201cEchoes of footsteps\/ Follow close […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1435,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[443],"class_list":["post-1434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-review","tag-the-soft-moon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1434"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1434\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1436,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1434\/revisions\/1436"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}