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Mazarin's chief creative force, Quentin Stolzfus, belongs to that fellowship of tunesmiths who embrace the listener with echos of musical things past. On We're Already There, his 1980s Anglophile devotion is on display throughout. Stolzfus reaches for a handful of Echo & the Bunneymen here ("See You In The Evening," "Another One Goes By") a dash of My Bloody Valentine there ("I'm With You And The Constellations"), and sprinkles The Stone Roses throughout ("At 12 To 6," "NE Winter"). Its best moment, "Louise," creates preciousness of the Epic Soundtracks kind—sparse, fueled by acoustic guitar and ocean sounds, combined with the pleasing nasality of Stolzfus' voice.
Sometimes, such anachronistic practitioners are lucky enough to hit the zeitgeist just right and ride their particular nostalgic wave to the bright lights. Check the recent success of The Killers' '80s reinterpretations. Yet more often this isn't the case, especially when the reflection is of Stolzfus' more intimate scale. Names like Kevin Tihista, The Clientele, and the aforementioned Soundtracks come to mind—artists celebrated by a devoted, almost chosen few. They reside in a realm of "bedroom" rock, a place fueled by softly strummed air-guitar glory, where radio play and moneyed contracts remain illusory. While We're Already There may not point to rock's next quantum step, it prevails on the strength of its vibrant daydream.
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