Paul Messis

I've got a new review up at the Dusted In Exile Tumblr of the very retro Case Closed from paisley revivalist Paul Messis.




Paul Messis — Case Closed (State Records)

The very first song on Paul Messis’ latest record, the 1960s-redolent Case Closed is called “I Hate the World Around Me.” It’s pretty clear why that might be the case. The song, which could easily fit on the Nuggets-Pebbles continuum, begins in a flower power jangle of guitar, psychedelic Moon drums kicking under Byrdsian electric folk rock. There are tight, giddy harmonies, a la the first couple of Beatles records, and quick mercurial shifts from major key brashness to minor key diffidence, just like in Odeyssey and Oracle.

It’s the kind of song that would have raised no eyebrows at all in 1967 or so, but singing it, Messis himself acknowledges its out-of-time-and-place oddity and his own anachronistic predicament. “To make it in this world / I’ve got to be somebody else / Live a life against myself,” he sings.

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This was one of those records I picked off the WFMU heavily played list without really knowing anything about it.