Released This Week: Diverse Projects Featuring Former Texans Windsor for the Derby

Tuesday April 3rd marks the date of two new releases featuring two different members of former Texas band Windsor for the Derby. In the late nineties, I tended to lump Windsor in with other Texas groups such as Bedhead, Transona 5, and American Analog Set. For me, the minimalism and repetition common with these bands captured a slacker-like ethic more attuned to apathy than, say, the class clownishness and sarcasm of slacker prototypes Pavement— who were too interested in having fun to be considered slack in a truly apathetic sense. At the same time, there were aesthetic elements of Windsor et al. that were implicit: vocals were typically diminished, lyrics were deemphasized, and musicianship was understated without ever being self-consciously elementary. Those elements addressed the apathy of the scene, and what I've found to be a distinctly Texan adherance to a code of stoicism that suppresses emotional expression: they provided an opportunity to emote vicariously through their songs, or offered introspection as a substitute. Good examples are Bedhead’s “Inhume” from the Dark Ages EP, and Windsor’s “Stasis” from their album Minnie Greutzfeldt.

Adam Wiltzie has worked extensively with Windsor for the Derby, and his band, Stars of the Lid, releases their first album in six years with Stars of the Lid and Their Refinement of the Decline. The band was formed in Austin in 1990, though Wiltzie now lives in Belgium and founding partner Brian McBride is based in L.A. Stars are named after the visuals you experience when you close your eyes, and if you imagine what a band so-named might sound like, you’re probably not far off from what Stars of the Lid actually do, um, sound like. I find that a little indulgence in the symphonic/ambient/drone niche goes a long way, and considering that “…Their Refinement…” is a double LP, I’m inclined to wait this one out.

Garnering lofty comparisons to New Order and Kraftwerk, Future Conditional boast a more commercially ambitious offering with their debut, “We Don’t Just Disappear.” With myriad contributors, Future Conditional is primarily the project of Cedric Pin and Glen Johnson of the ambivalence inducing Piano Magic. Principal Windsor for the Derby member Dan Matz graces the album with his characteristic lazy, almost half-a-note flat voice on the very good opening track, "Bright Lights & Wandering". In his appearance here, as elsewhere, his voice operates as if it was recorded in slow-motion and then played back at normal speed. "Crying's What You Need", sung by Angele David-Guillou of Klima, nearly has me waiting for the guitar hook in New Order’s “Regret.” Another one, "Volunteer", is very catchy and sung by Bobby Wratten of Trembling Blue Stars fame.

Meanwhile, Windsor for the Derby, now based in Philadelphia, have supposedly reconvened and are planning a new album, "How We Lost". Secretly Canadian has recently re-released some of the band’s Trance Syndicate records from their days in Austin, and this past fall their song “Melody of a Fallen Tree” was included on the rather decent Marie Antoinette soundtrack.