The Daddyo’s
Smother Your Brother
(Self-released, 2014)
B+
From the opening tip, Tulsa garage-pop band The Daddyo’s make it clear that while soft, sweet and inviting, their songs are strong at their core. “Just because I am a girl, doesn’t mean I need your help” The Daddyo’s sing on Smother Your Brother opener “Damsels” — an assurance to the listener that while this is a female-driven project, they are more than up to making and taking whatever they want. That’s not so much a stubbornness as it is matter-of-fact statement — one they support with each of these 11 songs as evidence. Capitalizing on all the promised cool of the band’s debut LP, It’s a Tough World Out There for a Lonely Girl, this is a modern Thelma & Louise road trip starring two dynamic, chic songwriters who bring a contemporary aesthetic into enduring ’50s-rock hooks and ’80s guitar tones.
Smother Your Brother is brimming with a semi-subversive brand of wholesome doo-wop and sunbather beach pop. The group is more sincere than sarcastic, though, and it makes for genuinely catchy melodies. Best Coast, Dum Dum Girls and Frankie Rose have all skinny-dipped into similar waters with their respective early output, and The Daddyo’s do it just about as well as any of them. The songs aren’t so much soaked in reverb as they are warbled and warped by sitting out in the heat too long, all while the vocals of singers Kylie Slabby and Kylie Hastings willfully melt into each other like friends sharing a wardrobe. Communal and inviting, you’d be hard-pressed to find a listener who dares not to spend an hour or two wanting to relax in the comfortable environment Smother Your Brother album projects.
Amber-hued “Damsels” especially delights, with its gentle vocal harmonies, nonchalant solos and relaxed-fit percussion fills reflecting off a pair of sunglass lenses; it’s effortless, dashingly cool and confidently restrained. The follow-up, “Crop Top,” does everything in its power to measure up to those fuzzy AM-radio charms and does in what might be an even more immediately accessible and addictively sugary melody. Here, the Kylies diverge, letting their voices playfully duel in the foreground with all the high stakes of a pillow fight. It’s lovably soft and energetic.
Wispy late-night trot “Peter,” scowling “Mexican King” and howling seance “High Tide” all play in nice contrast — streaks of dark grunge to the album’s otherwise sunny blonde disposition. “Peter” brings the tempo down a half step, with its gentle Telecaster bumps riding in time with the drum-skin pats and scratches. It’s a lulling but beautiful track that allows those ethereal croons to breathe life into the composition instead of just matching it. “Mexican King” is the most outwardly menacing and affected The Daddyo’s ever allow themselves to be, pairing edge with one of the fuller productions offered up here (in pockets, the swelling bass and guitar interplay starts to resemble string sections), like Lisa Frank’s answer Psychocandy.
Brief little one-offs like “Mr. Cool Guy,” crunchy college rocker “Licorice” and the feverish “Taco Spaceship” keep the pace on point, and The Daddyo’s keep it lean and tight throughout. For a buzzed, smoky, afternoon nap of a record, it never even flirts with the concept of laziness. Torn sleeves and cutoff jeans, it’s still purposeful in every decision, balancing out adorable winks with steely gazes, bouncy locks with calculated wit, tipsy stumbles with forceful strides, and cunning smirks with warm smiles, which make it exceedingly hard to not fall in love.
