Stinkin’ fresh
Think in French
Think in French describe their own sound as "'Lousy,’ a mix of loud and noisy. We want to be the loudest band in Reno,” says guitarist/vocalist/bassist Clint Neuerburg, “Our goal right now is to buy more amps.”
“It’s definitely like walking through a construction site,” says bassist/guitarist/vocalist Kyle Akins, of the band’s sound.
“Yeah, hard hats, no shirts,” concludes guitarist Mike Modene.
The “lousy” sound ranges from reverb and tremolo-drenched indie rock to squiggly guitar raunch in a way that’s reminiscent of mid-90s underground/college shoegazer rock (think Swervedriver or Sonic Youth’s ‘90s releases). It’s a sound that blends effects-laden guitar noise with conventionally structured songs.
This is the kind of band that will sometimes leave guitars lying on the floor or leaning against amps and manipulate the feedback using floor pedals. Their “secret weapons"are the Boss DD6 digital delay pedals that all three guitarists use. Using these pedals, high volume and a high-energy approach, the band creates swirling, quasi-psychedelic clusters of sound.
“It’s not so much that I like noise—I just really like feedback,” says Neuerburg.
The three guitarists met when they were all employees at the local branch of a certain monolithic music store, and the aesthetics of well-versed record store clerks are evident in the band’s sound. They joined forces with drummer Zdenda Mlika. Mlika is originally from the Czech Republic, where he started off as a guitar player before discovering the drums.
Neuerburg sings with a throaty shout, Akins with an offhand whisper, but both admit that lyrics take a backseat to the music. The songs are tightly structured. “A Fire of this Magnitude Must be Contained” and “Song A” feature sudden drops into silence that return to on-the-dime rock-outs. “Brooklyn Ghosts” features jittery rock riffs. Apparently chaotic breakdowns morph seamlessly into more melodic material.
Modene and Akins are both left-handed. Part of the band’s off-kilter guitar sound might come from the fact that Modene plays a right-handed guitar held upside down. The bass and treble strings are reversed and, in order to make basic chord shapes, Modene must finger them backwards. “It makes some stuff a lot harder,” says Modene. “But other things are easier.”
The band’s paradoxical name—it’s in English, after all—was excerpted from a Sharpie-decorated T-shirt of Akins. One band button features a rather incongruous picture of Albert Einstein, a German-born American citizen known more for thinking on the abstract plane than in French.
The name is occasionally misunderstood by excited and hard- of-hearing music fans as “Stinkin’ Fresh.”