Here’s the setup: the folks at RPM Challenge dared bands and solo artists to write, record and deliver a finished album in one month. Any number of things could happen under that kind of deadline: pigs could fly, songwriters could lose lots of sleep, and the biggest risk of all – the music could suck. One of the people who took the RPM bait was SoCal based twodoggarage, led by singer and songwriter Alex Kimmell. The band’s debut, Pinboy, was chock full of catchy pop tunes that brought Kimmell out of left field and onto our radar. This one, A Gross Display of Penmanship, with its diverse and interestingly arranged songs, is arguably even better. And further, the more you listen, the more it should grow on even the most skeptical of critics. Kimmell shows versatility galore with catchy ditties like “Something Real” and “Enough,” flowing mid-tempo Glen Phillips-esque tracks such as “Gradually Disappearing” and “Lift Me Up, Carry Me Down.” He even gets truly experimental on super-cool electronic instrumental “Circles” as well as on the rap-infused “The Runner” and spoken-word-meets-fuzz-box title track. Sure, the recording quality is at times bedroom-ish, but Kimmell makes the best of it, as well as the most of his time putting an album together on the fly. (self-released 2009)
