If you’ve been frequenting this site over the past two years or so, you may have stumbled across a couple of posts on Minneapolis, MN-based indie rock quartet Carroll. Comprised of founding members (and college classmates) Brian Hurlow (vocals) and Charlie Rudoy (drums), along with Max Kulicke (guitar) and Charles McClung (bass), the quartet can trace their origins to when the band’s founding duo decided to move in together into a house on Saint Paul, MN‘s Carroll Avenue after Rudoy had heard some early melancholy, shoegazer rock-based demos Harlow had written. After Kulicke and McClung were recruited to join the band, the newly-constituted quartet quickly received a reputation for one of the Twin Cities‘ hottest, up-and-coming bands as their debut EP Needs saw regular airplay on Minneapolis’ NPR affiliate The Current and two of the area’s biggest arts publications named them one of the area’s best new bands.
Building upon their early success, the quartet went to an abandoned cabin to record a handful of demos — demos, which eventually found their way on the desk of renowned producer Jon Low, who who has worked with The War on Drugs, The National. Local Natives, Mr. Twin Sister and others. And based on what he had heard, Low worked with the band on their self-titled full-length debut, which was released last year. In fact, last year, I wrote about two early singles “Alligator” a moody and atmospheric track comprised of shimmering and reverb drenched guitars, a driving rhythm and Harlow’s plaintive and melancholy falsetto in a song that reminded me of Hands‘ Massive Context. The album’s second single “Green Acres” continued the band’s reputation for moody and shimmering shoegaze-leaning indie rock as the band pairs gorgeous guitar chords, ethereal synth chords, soaring and anthemic hooks with brief bursts of acoustic guitar and Harlow’s swooning vocals to craft a song sounds like a half-remembered daydream. “Bad Water,” the Minneapolis, MN-based quartet’s latest single off their self-titled 2015 release has the band pairing shimmering guitar chords, propulsive rhythms and dreamy hooks with Harlow’s ethereal falsetto in what may arguably be the most 60s psychedelia and 70s AM Radio-leaning song that they’ve released to date — and in some way, it suggests a gentle expansion of the sound that has won them attention across the Midwest and the rest of the country.
The recently released music video for “Bad Water” is an employs the use of 60s-leaning psychedelic imagery — it’s trippy as hell and visually arresting.
