I Name You Destroyer

Jucifer takes all the heartwarming, bashfully romantic notions you?ve ever had about a couple making music together, puts them in the blender, pours two big pints, and (iclink/i) gulps them down. For a band of any size--let alone a duo--they pack an abundance of sound into each song. Both Ed Livengood?s skillfully crazed drumbeats and Amber Valentine?s distortion-heavy, pulpy guitar riffs have a thickness that seems to cry out, "Rebel against everything around you!" At the same time, though, the sound is rooted in poppiness, almost as if the pace and beats of each song were first conceived by Quincy Jones. Meanwhile, Valentine?s vocal work has a lilting, effortless quality that is similarly poppy in quality and would often seem only slightly discernable over the pulsing music behind it, except the lyrics fill her voice with an almost carelessly jaded potency. Though always derisive, the music is never angry (anger has been done, and it?s boring). Livengood and Valentine craft their corpulent sound with a skill that is never sloppy, never rash, yet makes it clear they aren?t interested in your opinion; they couldn't care less. I--Mark Huntsman/I