Tangiers – July/August 2003
by Rod Christie
Who: Tangiers
What: Garage Rock
Where: Toronto, ON
To Contact: Sonic Unyon, (905) 777-1223, www.sonicunyon.com.
Snarling trash at its best, Tangiers are currently riding more buzz than a dumpster full of glue sniffers. Formed in Toronto by Deadly Snakes refugees Josh Reichmann and Yuri Didrichsons, (both on guitar and vocals) with James Sayce on bass and Marco Moniz on drums. Tangiers hit loud, fast and heavy with debut album Hot New Spirits (Sonic Unyon, released March 2003), a collection of 13 tracks written by Didrichsons, Reichman and Sayce that references the toughest aspects of post-punk rock and roll.
Recorded at Toronto’s Chemical Sound in December 2002, Hot New Spirits wastes no time in establishing the bands garage credentials, veering quickly from snarling vocals to spitting guitars, and avoiding recent clichés with new wave thrash fused to subtle melodies.
The album was self-produced, recorded in one room off the floor with vocals overdubbed, exercising studio trickery only to the extent of setting up amps in the hall for that authentic reverb sound. Reichmann used a classic ’80s Tele/Twin set up, with Didrichsonn taking to task “some hollowbody guitar I can’t remember through a Garnet amp,” according to Reichmann.
Tangiers is already hot to record their second disc, scheduled to head into the studio before the end of the year. “I don’t have much patience waiting for bands I like to come up with their second album,” says Reichmann. “We have a bit more time now, so we’re upping the ante. For this album, it was “best song wins,” but now everyone has so many good songs, we’re just taking turns. We have a solid understanding of what our band sounds like now, so we are writing for the studio, knowing that it has to translate live.”
