XIII. Gibby and the Buzzkills asked us to play their CD release a few months ago, and I listened to their debut EP a number of times in the weeks prior to the show. My first reaction was that they were great songs, but not very inventive. But I kept listening, and was especially struck by the song “Detroit Soul,” which is the track that appears on the compilation. Sooner or later I realized that the terms ‘inventive’ or ‘innovative’ weren’t very useful on their own. A great deal of ‘innovative’ music I’ve heard, when I’m pushed to actually listen, is nothing more than some haphazard ‘experimentation’ (read: laziness) and is totally lacking any meaningul structure. Form and content, dude.

In the end, their music is well-studied, they wear their influences and references on their sleeves, and their aesthetic is that of the brokedown Detroit bar band that knocks you on your ass. Their invention is the arrangement of these influences, and their innovation is that they get it right.