Pseudosix

by Stewart MasonA baroque chamber pop band pitched somewhere between the elegant tweeness of Belle & Sebastian and the rustic neo-psychedelia of Mercury Rev, Pseudosix makes a virtue of variety. So much so, in fact, that that's only a description of their second album, their debut being considerably sparser and noisier. The sole constant of Pseudosix is singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Tim Perry, the band's only permanent member. Perry formed the band as a solo project in 2001, at first performing solo guitar and voice sets as Pseudosix (à la Bill Callahan as Smog or John Darnielle as the Mountain Goats) under the theory that the deliberately nonsensical band name was more memorable than his own given name. Based in the indie hipster mecca of Portland, OR, Perry soon picked up fellow musicians from other local bands for recording and touring purposes. Pseudosix's debut album, 2003's Days of Delay, was recorded with guitarist Emil Amos (of Delorean, the Holy Sons, and the Grails) and drummer Joe Kelly (of 31 Knots), for a stripped-down sound akin to a country-influenced Built to Spill. For his more ambitious second album, which took well over a year to write and record, Perry brought in a core band of Amos and his DeLorean bandmate Jay Clarke on keyboards, guitarist Dan Wilson and drummer Jake Morris from the Joggers, bassist Brandon Barnhill (the Forty First), and violinist Kate O'Brien-Clarke (Iretsu). Pseudosix was released by Sonic Boom Recordings in 2007.