I would VOLUNTEER that Thee Fine Lines is the best band to come out of Missouri in the last ten years. (What’s that, you say? Tennessee is the VOLUNTEER state, not Mih-ZURR-uh!? Well, someone’s gonna have to SHOW ME proof! Aah-hahahahaha…ahem.) State slogan nonsense aside, my hypothesis from the first sentence remains. I’ve been meaning to check these guys out for a couple a years, but, lazy ass that I am, never got around to it. Their latest CD falls into my lap by the grace of Razorcake, and now I realize how much more fulfilling the last few years would’a been had I been officially hipped to Thee Fine Lines. Set You Straight is primitive in the same manner that the Jewws’ L’explosion du son de Maintenant! was—three band members, three instruments, one heart, one stripped-down now sound, baby! The moodier, atmospheric songs, “Midnight’s Fine” and “You’re So Fine,” would fit nicely on any of the Teenage Shutdown compilations, while the trashier, up tempo numbers sound like they could have come out of San Francisco’s garage rock heyday of the early- to mid-’90s. Just try to listen to Set You Straight and keep your legs from going into crazy, rock’n’roll induced spasms.
–benke (Licorice Tree)