Heard them several months ago on a national program carried by NPR. Can't recall which. Have heard some other of their stuff, and I dig their sound.

 

Thoughts?

I've been hearing the name Parquet Courts for the last couple of years, but haven't taken a look until now since you've mentioned them which prompted me to finally once and for all check them out. Until tonight I had no true previous knowledge of what they were about.

 

I listened to a random hand full of songs, and although I can't exactly pin them down I was feeling that they were keeping late 80's and 90's college Indie alive while at times borrowing from the likes of the Velvet Underground sometimes with song structure, and also sometimes early 80's punk.

 

I also at times was occasionally hearing Luna in their music which can still fall under the VU comparisons. The lazy anti-melodic vocal approach reminds me of someone that I can't quite place my finger on.

 

They seem to have a penchant for experimentation that draws a lot from a sound that has in more recent years fallen out of favor with current artists. Not a bad thing for 80's and 90's college Indie could at times stretch the limits of what was music by straying away from being too polished, opting more for something a bit more raw and edgy.

 

Not that they sound like either Pavement or Archers of Loaf, I could still see them on the same bill as bands like them back in the 90's.

 

All in all it wouldn't surprise me if they mentioned that era of College Indie as a big influence on their sound as it feels more in line with that than anything that other artists are creating nowadays.

I've heard a handful from Parquet Courts...but none of it has honestly done much of anything for me. Nothing terrible, but I wasn't really taken one way or the other.