Short Take Review: MarsupiaL – Genus Thylacinus (MarsupialMusic) There are a lot of people out there waiting for this, the fourth CD from North Carolina based band MarsupiaL. This quartet of twin guitars, bass and drums has been working steadily since forming around 2000 and their fan base has been growing steadily. Taking their musical foundation from bands such as The Grateful Dead, Phish and Umphrey’s McGee, these guys straddle a bunch of musical boundaries. The disc starts out sounding a little like Dire Straits, and then shifts into something a little more Southern Rock oriented before shifting gears a couple more times. The music has an almost contradictory structured jamming quality. We slide from one genre to the next all the while displaying a roots, southern country flavoured tone. The disc has a nice mixture of short and long tracks, as long as “Lead On” [8:46] and “Naked in the Hall of Deduction” [9:39]. Here the music effortlessly slides around changing dynamics, time and tempo, one guitar will provide a distorted atmospheric backdrop while the other provides a delicate lead line. Other tracks clock in around 3-5-minutes where the composition tends to focus more on a straight forward song. Fans of the bands mentioned above will know instantly what to expect, but if you are unfamiliar you might want to check out the band at www.marsupialmusic.com (Jerry Lucky, 9/6/09)
