MP3 BAXTER HOUSE - Please Baxter Don´t Hurt ´Em

Baxter House's six song EP serves as a one act play, transporting the listener from an angels' choir to a mirrored fun house with detours into fiery perdition.

6 MP3 Songs
ROCK: Punk, POP: Quirky



Details:
Audio Exposure Magazine

http://www.audioxposure.com/artists/reviews/baxterhouse.htm

A lot of female-fronted punk or rock outfits rely too heavily on screaming or whining their way through an entire song about being screwed over by this guy or that. Not so with Baxter House's Please Baxter, Don't Hurt 'Em. Instead, Rachel Mintz gives you all the attitude you can handle while, at the same time, she's caressing your ear drums with a sweet melody. She'll fool you into thinking she's an angel and Satan herself all within the same number. Baxter House refuses to be put into a box with any one genre labeling, and instead breaks rules freely as they feel the desire, making Please Baxter, Don't Hurt 'Em a rather unique (and I'm rarely willing to use that term) compilation. Mintz almost deserves a spot in The Met for perhaps being the epitome of modern art, between her unconventional work and vinyl performance attire. Baxter House manages to avoid the expected in every way. No Food gives you a good range of what the band, and especially Rachel, can bring to the table, while you can listen to Mintz have an almost introspective conversation with herself in Dissociative Personality Disorder. When you throw in the rest of the EP, Fat Gross Cowboy, Black Skies, MKAO, and Gumdrop Heaven, what you get is an addictive assault on the senses. Imagine Dorothy and the Wicked Witch of the West all rolled into one, gathering you around in a circle for grown-up story time - that's Please Baxter, Don't Hurt 'Em. Just give in. You don't really have a choice.

- Jenn

Editor

editor@audioxposure.com


Crusher Magazine, Flex Your Head Magazine and Ear Candy Magazine

http://www.crushermagazine.com/rev12_05/baxterhouse.htm http://flexyourhead.com/review_display.php?id=1176
http://www.earcandymag.com/reviews42.htm

Baxter Houses playful album title is unindicative of the fury that the trios six tracks give off, as tracks like Fat Gross Cowboy contains enough anger to make Courtney Love blush. This female fronted band twist the punk rock ethic with toy piano interludes, infectious choruses like the one found on Black Skies, and Candyland-esque trippy ditties gone punk like Gumdrop Heaven. Sweet on one side and very bitter on the other, Baxter Houses stripped down angst and tongue in cheek abruptness smashingly radiate the perils of punk rock.

----Mike SOS


MUSIC DISH (Industry Journal) and THE LANCE MONTHLY
http://www.musicdish.com/mag/?id=10814

Ping-ponging back and forth between quiet and loud, Baxter House yields a sound that is nothing short of startling. Just when you think you're being serenaded by a lullaby, the volume is suddenly cranked up full blast, shrieking guitars take charge and the vocals wail in pain.

Powerful and explosive, Baxter House involves tracks like "Fat Gross Cowboy" and "Dissociative Personality Order" that keenly represent this Los Angeles trio's penchant for angst-riddled sentiments. Naked emotions, teeming with frustration and a determined will to make some serious racket are the stuff that causes Baxter House to tick. The grooves are punishing and the feel is raw and hairy. A hardcore punk rock philosophy is arguably at work here. Good for Baxter House for playing music for the sheer sake of playing music.

--Beverly Paterson

Independent Clauses Magazine

http://www.independentclauses.com/feb_06_content/baxter_house.html

"Baxter House shouldâve subtitled this album âHow to Create a Huge Splat on the Musical Worldâ- because thatâs exactly what theyâve accomplished with this 6-song, 12-minute EP. They establish their guitar/drums/vocals sound and they donât back down off it. There arenât any concessions, there arenât any genre fusions- this is stripped down rock with a snotty punk attitude. If you like it, youâll love it, and if you donât, youâll be confused.
Itâs an extremely galvanizing record in the fact that thereâs not a lot to respond to- thereâs the female sung vocals, the female screamed vocals, the guitars that borrow from both the herky-jerky fervor of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and the sludgy melodicism of an old school punk band, and extremely versatile drums that mutate to fit whatever the guitar is doing. If youâre put off by the girl screaming in âNo Foodâ, then youâre put off- thereâs not much other stuff going on that you can focus on.
That narrows our focus right at the songwriting- are these songs good or not? The answer is mostly yes. While the guitar sometimes gets a little bit bland (parts of âBlack Skiesâ), songs like âMKAOâ are just incredible on all cylinders. âMKAOâ has verse that are very subdued (the drums even do some mellow rimshots), but the chorus just rips wide open, with the vocals and guitars and drums all going full tilt. They use some interesting rhythm patterns in the chorus of âMKAOâ, as well as in âDissociative Personality Disorder.â
They do a really good job of mixing it up, though- the intro to âBlack Skiesâ is just drums and vocals, and âBlack Skiesâ also includes a toy piano, in a cool touch. âGumdrop Heavenâ is only forty-five seconds long- but then again, itâs a Baxter House version of reggae. I think that gets props in itself.
So basically, this EP rocks. The songs are good, the instrumentation is unusual, and the sound is fresh enough to pass an USDA test. Theyâre not going to change the world, but theyâll certainly make a big splat when theyâre dropped right in the middle of your day. Youâll remember Baxter House. Whether you enjoy that memory or not is up to you."

-Stephen Carradini
independentclauses@hotmail.com