[A small part of this review was first published in Badaboom Gramophone #3 and appears here with permission.]
The Silly Pillows, a pop outfit latterly based in rural Pennsylvania, formed in 1986 and began issuing catchy four-track songs on tape a few years later; the ’90s brought an increasing flow of songs on vinyl and CD as well. Jonathan Caws-Elwitt and his wife Hilary (whose brother Matthew leads Nada Surf) initially formed the band’s core; Jonathan continued on with friends and other siblings (including guitar-playing brother Sam) after Hilary bowed out in 1992. (She returned to help revive the group in 2007.) The Silly Pillows like strong melodic hooks, major seventh chords, chugging rhythms, ’60s and ’70s songcraft and finesse at recording.
Documenting the group’s early homebrew efforts from 1986 to 1993, Silly Image Pillowhead (shame about the artwork) is a delightful potpourri of unfussy four-track invention, some of it evidently reclaiming work from earlier releases. When she’s not singing lead (as on “Ma Grande”), Hilary’s role is hard to parse but obviously crucial to the creative ingenuity and spirited fun here. “Now Now Now Now Now Now” is dizzy dada; “Frozen Vegetables” an exercise in tape echo; “Waterslide” sloppy/peppy pop-punk. A definite IFYL for for fans of R. Stevie Moore. With a handful of the same tracks, Pillow Image Ltd. (clever title, that) is a vinyl distillation of early cassette creations, 1986–’92.
Up in the Air is a Norwegian catch-up compilation of sorts with two new songs joining ten selections from Strangest of the Strange (itself half a ’91–’92 compilation) and Equilibrium. Restrained, almost mainstream-styled in spots, it’s not the most invigorating Silly Pillows release. The album’s featured singer is Cheryl De Luke, whose warm, deep voice is charming but seems to have led the band into bland styles that don’t really suit them. She does a fine job on the very pretty “Lilac Road,” a perfectly good tune from Strangest of the Strange that is a far cry from the band’s later frivolity. The layered harmonies and chord changes of “Love on the Marginal Way” suggest the Beach Boys, a strange direction for these indie kids to be taking.
Although it was recorded in a real studio, Out of Our Depth could be a living room project. Chirpy and casual, it proudly retains markers of willful indie informality like the pitchy, reverbed vocals and the cardboard-box-sounding drums. Jonathan’s high, light voice, in tandem with singer Linda Smith, projects carefree youthful pleasure in tuneful numbers like “End of My Nose” (nicely punctuated with horns) and “My Little World.” “Katy Tongue in Cheek” is sung entirely in French.
Sam Elwitt (guitar, vocals) and Belinda Miller (vocals) are Jonathan’s main foils on the well-produced and peppy New Affections. If their harmonies don’t embrace pitch as an absolute concept, the sextet’s playing (on such fanciful instruments as casaba, poultronics, mermaphone and nose stromboli in addition to more familiar rock implements) is confident and clear. Sung over bouncy piano with continental élan, “The Woman in the Iridescent Clothes” is both a stylistic outlier and — neck and neck with the effervescent “Groovy Tune” — the album’s best track.
Pillow Paw Prints is a Japanese compilation with tracks dating from 1989–’96.