by David Wilikofsky
When it was announced that Horsegirl, a Chicago based band formed by teenagers Penelope Lowenstein, Nora Cheng, and Gigi Reece, had signed to Matador over a year ago, it was a bit of a surprise. At the time the group was a largely unknown entity with only a handful of singles to their name; though those songs had built some buzz around the band, it’s rare for a label with the stature of Matador to pluck a band with such a slim body of work out of relatively obscurity. However, listening to their debut album, the partnership makes perfect sense. It’s a sparkling take on college rock, and an album that instantly sounds like a well worn favorite.
It’s easy to imagine Versions of Modern Performance as a long lost relic of Matador’s untouchable ’90s run, and you can hear echoes of some of the era’s marquee artists peppered throughout the album. At times the abstraction of Horsegirl’s lyrics echo the twisted riddles of early Pavement. The blown-out, atmospheric melodicism of tracks like “Beautiful Song” and “The Fall of Horsegirl” bring to mind the masterful fuzz-pop of Yo La Tengo. The upbeat post-punk instrumentals and vocal interplay of opener “Anti-Glory” remind me a bit of prime Sleater-Kinney. I could go on; most songs induce some degree of nostalgia, as if they were a long forgotten favorite. But Versions of Modern Performance is also much more than a rote exercise in pastiche. From the album’s structure (which includes multiple atmospheric interludes that help tie everything together) to the mashup of genres within the songs themselves, the band prove themselves to be collagists rather than copyists, mixing and matching these familiar sounds in their own image.
There are some rough edges. The band’s songwriting tends to be cryptic, at times a bit too impenetrable for my taste. But Horsegirl have something ineffable on their side: chemistry. The band’s existence is rooted in both their deep personal friendship and the thriving Chicago DIY community, and the strength of those relationships are imbued in each and every note of this album. It’s a set of songs where the joy in each note is palpable, almost as if they recorded the album purely for their own pleasure. It’s these bonds that will undoubtedly propel Horsegirl to even greater heights, but as an introduction Versions of Modern Performance is about as strong as they come.