Guaranteed Reviews

Dig Deeper Music (2006)
www.satellitesongs.com

How I Feel About It

This band from Sacramento has all the hallmarks of a boy band: the look, saccharine and angst-ridden vocals and unnecessarily whispered lyrics. But upon repeated spins and further review of their materials, especially their lyrics, I realized this first impression was unreliable or shallow.

I found that after listening a few times, their songs were stuck in my head, but I drew a blank when forced to sit down and write about why they are so sticky.

Satellite is an extremely melancholy band and their sugary presentation reminds me a bit of Coldplay. Gordon Hanley has a heartfelt delivery which stands out far more than the sotto voce of Chris Martin. It soars out over the soft touch of the rest of the band which almost seems reticent to do anything other than frame his vocals. However, the band doesn’t use the piano like Coldplay and the material is not quite as mature or dry as Martin’s. The songs bring me back to high school. It’s as if Satellite is an extremely skilled high school band, soap operatic in their romances and given to final kisses-on-the-lips.

They share that same haunting quality that Elliott Smith, and to some extent, Radiohead purvey. Hanley has a beautiful tenor, most effective when he uses his falsetto, but the band makes strange choices. Falling Airplanes and Empires Fall are beautiful songs in which Hanley seems most comfortable, while Break My Yesterdays and You Fill Up My Eyes suffer from a tentativeness which may be responsible for bad, or weak, intonation. Zach Dubin’s guitar work is challenging in that on one hand he casually, effortlessly supports Hanley’s singing, but sometimes diverges into solos with jarring intervals. This differs greatly from the otherwise straight ahead convention of the band. I’m all for the use of these intervals, but it’s confusing and in Break My Yesterdays and You Fill Up My Eyes, I have to wonder if his guitar pulls Hanley into sour territory.

Having said that, this is the kind of band that hauls your teen daughters into their embrace and doesn’t let go. If they were MY daughters, and the band showed up at MY house, I would strip search the band and make them swear to pacts, signed in blood, to treat my progeny with dignity. That’s how powerful their music is.

What I Think About It

I thoroughly enjoy the band’s instrumental restraint and the strategic tact with which they arrange their songs. Their lyrics are not obvious. With few exceptions they avoid cliché, unlike most of the bands that appeal to teen girls.

But there are problems. The band describes Hanley’s vocals as ‘sometimes strident’ on its website. It’s simply not true. Strident means loud, harsh or grating and his vocals are too clear for that. What’s vexing is that he and the band bring you so quickly and easily into their world, like PROFESSIONALS, but then the intonation goes suddenly south, and it’s a strange effect listening to an otherwise beautiful tenor singing near the Well of Cringing Ears, if not fully immersed in it. This is the one impediment to my full-on recommendation of this band to my teen daughters.

Luckily, this EP is essentially a demo. I’d be surprised if, in spite of the flaws, a label didn’t pick them up. With a full-length release they can polish their material to perfection. Despite the difficulties, Hanley has a hypnotic voice and his band compliments him almost to a fault.

The reader owes it to him or herself to go to the band’s website and listen to Falling Airplanes and Empires Fall. They are songs that suggest the possibility of Satellite becoming a household name.

Steve Perry (no relation)