Excerpt: “If I had to describe Hotels, I’d have to recur to words like ’spaced-out,’ ‘poppy,’ and ’synthesizer,’ and I’d be using these words, for the most part, positively. Though you can hear that the 80s had a strong influence on their sci-fi indie pop (they even have songs titles like ‘Flight of the Navigator’), I can’t quite say they sound like band X or Y. It’s pop, that’s for sure, and the flourishes and sounds give everything a dreamy touch without affecting the catchiness of it all. Since I picked this one up on Valentine’s Day I’ve found it to be a solid, throroughly enjoyable album.”

The Yellow Stereo

“one of my albums of the year already...maybe even the decade…”

The Underground Of Happiness

Excerpt: “this is pop made in outer space… Album opener and first single ‘Hydra’ sounds like an updated pop version of the theme to cult science-fiction TV show Lost In Space, while the lush ‘Near The Desert, Near The City’ has us floating in weightlessness, and tunes like ‘Leilani’ and ‘Port Of Saints’ makes me imagine little green men dancing around… Picture a more cheerful Joy Division playing in a different galaxy and you might have some idea of what Hotels sound like. Where Hearts Go Broke has its somber moments as well though but overall it’s a pretty fast paced, not to mention fun album.”

I Am The Crime

Hidden Shoal Recordings has announced the release of the single ‘Do You Believe in Dinosaurs? (Scott Solter Remix)’ by American folk-pop deconstructionists The Caribbean. The track comes from the forthcoming release Scott Solter Re-Populates The Caribbean. The band has teamed up with engineer, producer, mixologist Scott Solter (Spoon, Okkervil River, The Mountain Goats) to bring you an EP of dizzying curve balls that split the difference between glistening songcraft and complete re-construction. Solter’s chop-shop version of ‘Do You Believe In Dinosaurs?’ is at once stripped down and muscular – as if emanating from a ghettoblaster that slices and dices. The vocals from the original are all but gone, the rhythm section made guttural and immediate, and the modulating synths have been harassed and brought to the fore. Through his inimitable approach, Solter has managed to amplify and distill the original.

The idea of sending five tracks from The Caribbean’s 2007 Hometapes record Populations to Scott Solter to deconstruct, warp, and otherwise obliterate, was neither intimidating nor foreign to the band. While Solter was busy toiling with 2” tape, textiles, liquid polymers, and computers in his North Carolina sound lab, the group became familiar with Hidden Shoal and it became clear to both group and label that the Caribbean/Solter EP was, conceptually, just the kind of project that might be perfect for the label to release.

“You’re forced to occupy their barren pop architecture…. You don’t understand it, but, though you might not admit it, you do hope it will understand you. Or at least not destroy you…” – Pitchfork

‘Do You Believe In Dinosaurs? (Scott Solter Remix)’ is available for free download from the Hidden Shoal Store until the release of Scott Solter Re-Populates The Caribbean on 2nd April 2009. Read a full press release here.

The Caribbean – Do You Believe in Dinosaurs? (Scott Solter Remix)   The Caribbean – Do You Believe in Dinosaurs? (Scott Solter Remix)