Loud Planes Fly Low by the Rosebuds: Review

Some of the most emotional trials people can face involve the end of a relationship. The Rosebuds captured those emotions in Loud Planes Fly Low, with one rare twist: the end of the relationship was that of their own.

Four albums ago, married couple Ivan Howard and Kelly Crisp released their first full-length album, Make Out. It was full of pop cheer and enticing coos, inviting the listeners to dance around in the delight of new love and adventures. Night of the Furies took Rosebud fans to a darker, mythological tour of lovers separated by living and dead worlds, while Life Like delved into Kelly and Ivan's southern storytelling roots.

Now we arrive at Loud Planes Fly Low, in which every song seems to be loaded with the tension of a break up. Not just the emotions of anger and hurt, but the complicated mixtures of love and pain when a couple, who had built a life around a shared love of music, divorces.

No one in the public has a right to know exactly what brought Kelly and Ivan '‹Å"s marriage to an end, but we can't help but speculate about some events since, admittedly, Loud Planes has songs inspired by not just the end, but the roads leading to it. Who's to say that tracks on previous albums were also about the tough moments of their relationship? Lyrics on Loud Planes revolve around their own feelings and contributions to the end, minus accusations and allegations. One has to wonder what it was like to record songs like "Come Visit Me", where Kelly seemingly yearns for Ivan to stop by "even if it makes it worse". She sings as if to say feeling something about a relationship, no matter how painful, is better than feeling nothing at all.

In "Without a Focus", Ivan describes the complications of still living or working with someone that used to be your lover and the physical separation can't happen any faster. "And you look over at me every day/ And I look over at you every day/ I don't know how I'm supposed to wait."

This wouldn't be the first time that music couples set the baggage aside in support of the music, much like divorced parents coexisting to watch their child perform. Fleetwood Mac and The White Stripes had done it very successfully. Gwen Stefani and No Doubt made a living from singing songs about the break up between her and bassist Tony Kanal. The Rosebuds have enough talent and maturity to make it last through this album. The complicated instrumental layers and back-and-forth vocals from Kelly and Ivan suggest that if they can record in close quarters together, a tour is completely doable. They'll be opening for Bon Iver throughout the end of 2011.

All things aside, one can still hear the art seeping through the speakers. To wit, Loud Planes may be the best album in the Rosebud's cadre, even though it's missing the pop fun you normally find on every one of their albums. Second Bird of Paradise's most heart-tugging moments occur when the violin enters the front of the room and winds down the song. In fact, you hear melancholy strings throughout several tracks, to include "Waiting For You".

There are tracks that do bring us back sonically to earlier Rosebud work. "Woods" does evoke a little bit of that up-tempo vibe found on "I Better Run" from Furies, even bringing back the pounding piano and staccato rhythms building up anticipation. The musical arrangement at the beginning of "A Story" is like "Wishes for Kisses" on Make Out , until the drums make a dramatic, heart-pounding rhythmic turn halfway through the song and introduce a spine-crawling violin contribution and ending with lingering keyboards. Loud Planes ends with "Worthwhile", featuring Ivan singing "girl, I want to make this all worthwhile."

Despite some of the shared pain and uncomfortablness close friends and longtime fans might feel while listening, it's more believable to hear about these emotions of ended relationships from a real-life couple versus underage pop stars. Loud Planes Fly Low is a worthwhile listen.