The Last Town Chorus - The Last Town Chorus (2003)

The Last Town Chorus, aka singer, songwriter, and lap steel guitarist Megan Hickey and guitarist Matt Guy, self-released their first album in 2003; the estimable British indie Blast First reissued the set in 2005, just before the duo split up. (Hickey has since maintained the band name with various guest musicians.) The Last Town Chorus is a bare-bones slice of dream pop that owes equal amounts to the 4AD Records ethos of atmosphere above all and the downcast ache of the mid-'90s slowcore bands like Low and Bedhead. Barring a few minimal bass, organ, and percussion overdubs, these nine songs consist entirely of Hickey's mournful vocals and idiosyncratic lap steel playing, with Guy's effects-heavy guitar lines in a decidedly secondary accompanist role. Hickey, originally a bassist, had never played the lap steel guitar until the duo started, and her lack of training means that her playing style is well outside the usual blues and country tradition; on songs like "The Ground," a closer comparison is Mary Timony's detuned slide guitar in the mid-'90s indie band Helium, Hickey offering up near-atonal swells and waves of sound. The sound of The Last Town Chorus is decidedly narcotic, with none of the tunes venturing beyond a somnambulant tempo and with few emotional settings beyond "mopey." As a result, The Last Town Chorus at least sets and maintains a mood for attractive ambient listening, but closer attention isn't repaid.