Ferocious Bubbles

If it?s true that, as Elvis Costello once famously opined, writing about music is like dancing about architecture then describing the music of Ferocious Bubbles may resemble an arc that begins with Isadora Duncan and ends with Merce Cunningham. It?s a music that even at its most spare is beautiful and fluid ? never afraid of abstraction, incident, or the ability to change. At its essence is a vital buoyancy that, despite singer / songwriter Pete Szelenbaum?s tendency to stay grounded, pulls everything skyward. There are no fixed points ? even when things seem irrevocably stuck. There are several songs in the Ferocious Bubbles oeuvre that long for something off in the distance, but never before has the band released an album so occupied with the notion of escape. That being said, one might imagine the Ferocious Bubbles? latest album, Save Yourself and Run Away as the soundtrack of the modern dance equivalent of Waiting For Godot. Listen close and you?ll hear the nervous shuffle that comes before making a move towards the unknown: Ecstasy, fear, calm, darkness, acceptance ? it?s all there. But despite the rush of ?Airport,? ?Skywaves? or the soaring title track, the protagonists of Save Yourself and Run Away are on the verge of movement but never quite make a leap. Or so our ears tell us: Perhaps it?s only through that ?Hopeless sense of hope that only the hopeless would know? described to us in Save Yourself and Run Away?s meditative centerpiece, ?St. Jude,? that we know there is life after the track fades... That we know someone has made a move somewhere. Ferocious Bubbles began with Pete Szelenbaum?s head full of songs and a four-track recorder. Though he had been writing songs for some time, it wasn?t until 1999 that a revolving cast of friends and admirers lent their considerable talents to fleshing these songs out live and in the studio ? resulting in a self-titled E.P. With its sweet lyrics, inventive production, and brevity, the eponymous title said it all: the Ferocious Bubbles were aggressively sublime. The feeling that Ferocious Bubbles were something a community affair was furthered with Absence is a Strange Something ? the band?s first full-length album. It was during this time that a Ferocious Bubbles show might feature more than half a dozen musicians, including a miniature string section. As luck would have it, that revolving door policy eventually led to the current line up of Szelenbaum on an overdriven acoustic guitar, guitarist Nick Punch, bassist Vic Donati, drummer Randall Shurbet, and multi-instrumentalist Ken Moore. It?s this current line-up that recorded Save Yourself and Run Away and, perhaps not so surprisingly, represents the group?s most powerful amalgam to date. In a live setting the band breaths powerful new life into even the album?s most delicate compositions ? if you think the album version of ?St. Jude? is breathtaking, it?s live counterpart may move you to tears. Pete once told Fleabomb.com "I like making songs because the final product, even though you can record onto tape or CD, it's nothing you can see or hold. It's nothing tangible, and it's subject to repeated interpretation every time you play it. There's something really liberating about knowing that something will never be the same way twice.? With the band already collectively writing and recording a new album, one may only guess as to where Ferocious Bubbles may lead us next. What we can be sure of is that moves are being made ? and the destination is sure to be somewhere beautiful.