Oh God, you devil, Carey Mercer. The man – or a fluttering red guy in the left ear and a fluttering white dude in the right ear, always at odds — is more of an unsolved mystery than a missing man could ever be. The Frog Eyes lead singer always makes it feel that you’re 100 books of reading short of ever getting a bead on his core. He sings about scorn and frustration as if they were downed power lines, hissing in the puddles along wet, post-stormy streets. He sings as if he’s a lion using a tree the thickness of an anchor supporting the Golden Gate Bridge as a scratching post, shaving the bark off like hot cheese, shredding it with massive paws ripping down with an ease of vengeance. He writes as if he were out in an acid rain storm and he were sprinting around, desperate and filled up to ears with anger. Within that anger is more compassion than the naked wildness of craziness has ever been known to have. From corruption of emotion and life as he knows it, there’s a feeling that he’s taking care of the subversion on Tears of the Valedictorian, the band’s newest and most epic of the band’s releases. It feels that he wants for the best and all of the piss and vinegar that he shoots out in a fireworks display gone chaotic is just necessary, not reckless. His voice and his motives and ways are authentic and completely original. When Frog Eyes visited us well over a year ago, some of the songs from Tears were newborn babies and their debuts were startling and colossal, easily accepted as his best work yet, even if they weren’t imagined fully. “Caravan Breakers” is a classic, a study of the powerless and about a thousand other things. It’s an impression – with Mercer’s hyperventilating pouts and spewing – that is formidable and dangerously lasting. Frog Eyes is set to release a split EP with Destroyer – a band they’ve backed on tours of the world – in early January on Absolutely Kosher Records. The track listing is such:
A1: Frog Eyes – Policy Merchant 2: Ah Shit Man
A2: Frog Eyes – Stockades 2: You Are The Water…
B1: Hello Blue Roses – Foam Hands (Destroyer cover)
B2: Hello Blue Roses – Wall of Death (Richard and Linda Thompson cover)

Frog Eyes: Daytrotter Session Songs

Frog Eyes: Daytrotter Session Article

Absolutely Kosher Records