Peter Kolovos is broken. Hearing it fall apart with scratch and claw is as heartbreaking as it is entrancing. Maybe we should help him, but then the far out guitarist would not be creating the magnificent work he’s etching from steel and wood. Kolovos falling apart is also keenly aware of the sound of the Pacific Northwest; a mythical and oft-changing “sound” that has been a commodity and a commercial for the two hubs of cultural (Portland and Seattle) that have sprung forth from the post-grunge-silicon-sludge. “No Daze” is the winter drizzle of Seattle and yet its temperature rarely drops below 40. It’s the hum of the bus engine as it cuts through all those gentrified neighborhoods still teeming with rebellion and scum. “Pure Fire, I Understand Consumption,” is the artier, lighter take. It’s Portland as seen from its Rose Gardens , all its Midwestern-like sprawl unfurling before you like the ripples traveling throughout Kolovos’ strings. It’s the pluckiness of the younger sibling, now beginning to eclipse and overtake its nerdier, dour brother to the North. Part of it wants to break away completely from the shadow; the other is hungry and ready to devour its fraternal twin. Of course, this is just an album of awesome guitar sketches from a man whose built a modest legacy on shredding, so maybe I’m reading too much into it. But if you’ve experienced the world from those forgotten American cities, you tend to project. Isolation does crazy things to us wolves.
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