When bands progress at a dizzying rate, there's no assurance their loyalists will stick with them. Sudden shifts in dynamic can be frustrating if they don't feel organic, as can follow-ups that have little to do with what preceded them.
John Dwyer, nee the man behind Coachwhips, Pink & Brown, and close to a dozen other lesser known entities, is one of those artists who makes drastic changes from album-to-album and somehow keeps the returns high, if not higher, with each subsequent release. Thee Oh Sees alone have already cycled through a few monikers -- including OCS -- and seven, count ’em, seven records since 2004 (including an m-f'n double-album and a 6-inch lathe-cut run of exactly 51 copies).
The quality control has remained high; while I fell in love with the echo-folk of 2 and 3 & 4, Dwyer has held my attention as his Oh Sees slowly wade into rock ‘n’ roll waters, beginning with slight traces on Cool Death of Island Raiders, bluesy belting on Thee Oh Sees Sucks Blood, and, now, all-out 1950s greaser rock with The Master's Bedroom Is Worth Spending the Night In, a superior specimen to Sucks Blood and another reason to join Dwyer's cult.
Sung almost entirely duet-style -- Brigid Dawson being the second layer -- The Master's Bedroom corrals 14 versions of the same song. Luckily it's a fucking sweet song, well worth revisiting over and over for nuance. A noise flutter here, an ascension there, a clickity-clack of some sort to break up the monotony; we're talking about an A-and-B conversation between musician and listener -- any distractions can oh-C their way out of it.
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