make-a-mess records

Knight School is a fresh-faced duo (sometime trio) from
New York City transmitting mesmeric frequencies like star
students of a cassette-pop underworld. Revenger is their
second full-length record following 2009’s self-released
The Poor and Needy Need to Party, and their first for a mi-
nor label: San Francisco’s Make a Mess Records.

Knight School populates gorgeous, entrancing melo-
dies with opaque lyrics that are often bleak, sometimes
humorous and often bleakly humorous (sometimes). Their
concise songs have a strange air akin to a celebratory sad-
ness, like bounding out of the house in the middle of sum-
mer to find yourself in the midst of a once-in-a-lifetime
snowstorm.

Kevin Alvir and Chris Balla wrote and recorded Re-
venger themselves, conjuring epic bedroom hypnosis from
acoustic guitars, electric jangle and chime, primitive drum
machines, tumbling drum kits and dreamy harmonies (and
harmonicas). The album recalls early Guided By Voices,
’60s folk-pop wonderment, The Go-Betweens and post-
punk-era indie, but casts off into foreign waters on the
strength of its own charmingly personal vision.