On Repeat The Optimistic

The songs on local outfit The Optimistic’s new self-titled disc have actually floated around for at least a couple years now. Guitarist Louka Patenaude recorded most of the tracks by himself, burned them onto a CD-R, and got a band together for a few shows—between jobs playing guitar alongside folks ranging from jazz pianist Ben Sidran to reggae group Natty Nation. He also recorded demos for a second Optimistic record, but recently packaged up the first, 13-song disc respectable-like with a cover depicting a winged dog standing on a mushroom cloud.

While you’d expect all his gigging experience to bleed into an eclectic solo project, Patenaude has written rock songs since the early '90s, and on this record he mostly ends up with a shaggy pop sound he dubs “Northern rock.” At its best, this genre seems to consist of straightforward, guitar-driven songs with a wry twist, something a weary Midwesterner and his case of Schlitz can hibernate with in a place like the Glass Nickel’s basement, where the band plays an opening set Saturday night.

It’s as if Patenaude, too, is hibernating from the professionalism of a working musician’s life and trying his hand at a more informal sound. He approaches this singer-songwriter-rocker role with little hints of his jazz experience (especially on the short instrumental “A Room In The Desert”), but also an outsider’s playfulness, especially on the back-to-back highlights, “Minoan Pillars” and “Universal Healthcare.” Both songs have managed to stick in Decider’s local-music memory these past two years, as much for the slightly puzzling lyrics as for the melodies. They just hit this balance of warm rocking and bleak moping, as when Patenaude gets to the refrain of “Universal Healthcare,” promising (or warning?) that “tonight the bars will be / full of your family.” “Minoan Pillars” has that kind of vague twist to it as well: “It all started when they figured out / they could get that feeling without tryin’.”

"Universal Healthcare" by The Optimistic