The Mendoza Line

Founded in the mid-1990s in Athens, Georgia, The Mendoza Line survived numerous line-up changes and a move to New York, but not the break-up of core members Timothy Bracy and Shannon McArdle's marriage. 30 Year Low—their eighth and final album and a sometimes chronicle of where things went wrong—mixes pathos with a tart self-awareness for a fitting farewell.

As if mirroring the misery and fury of a relationship in decline, the record moves between soft, contemplative country songs and rockier, angrier tunes. "31 Candles," a tightly ferocious takedown of an unfaithful partner, is followed by "Love on Parole," a delicate, wistful piano song, while "I Lost My Taste" sounds like early Lou Reed with its cocky, chatty set of half-spoken lyrics and chaotic fuzz.

The bonus disc, Final Reflections of the Legendary Malcontent, contains double the songs of the album proper, comprising covers, demos, alternate takes and live recordings. It's a simpler pleasure than 30 Year Low, with a straight cover of Cole Porter's "Anything Goes," McArdle's beautiful, vibrato version of Springsteen's "Tougher Than the Rest," and a nearly whispered demo version of the band's own "Now or Never or Later." The two-disc collection might be a strange introduction for new listeners—akin to walking into the middle of a fight that turns into a trip down memory lane—but should make a worthwhile investment for long-time fans.

—Hillary Brown
08.20.07

Brooklyn's the Mendoza Line have been poised at the brink of a precipice throughout their ten-year existence. 2000's masterful We're All in This Alone was a thrust and parry exchange between the principal combatants, husband and wife Timothy Bracy and Shannon McArdle, and the band's last effort, 2005's Full of Light and Full of Fire, seemed to foreshadow relational failure with a fatalistic shrug. So it should come as no great surprise that with 30 Year Low, the husband-and-wife duo, and the existence of the band itself, go hurtling over the edge of the cliff. Divorce albums, of course, have always constituted their own hypercharged subgenre, with Bob Dylan's Blood on the Tracks and Richard & Linda Thompson's Shoot Out the Lights at the head of the sadsack class. You can slot 30 Year Low just slightly below those masterpieces. While Bracy tends to couch his sorrow and self-loathing in poetic sentiments and alt country rambles, McArdle goes straight for the rock & roll jugular, and the contrasting styles create the tension that fuels this album. Bracy's Dylanesque rasp chronicles the dissolution of the couples' marriage on the disquieting ballad "Love on Parole," while the title track finds him employing an extended marriage-as-stock-market metaphor on a Bakersfield lope that could have originated with Merle Haggard or Buck Owens. Only his "I've Lost My Taste," which verges on mush-mouthed Dylan parody, fails to connect. If anything, McArdle is even more of a revelation. "Stepping on My Heels" is a lovely, disquieting meditation on aging and the chew 'em up and spit 'em out nature of the music industry. And "31 Candles" is a great, raging mess of snarling guitars, snarky commentary, and bitterness and recrimination, a cathartic middle finger to a marriage that was, and is no more. It's clear evidence that these folks won't be making music together anytime soon. And that's a shame. Aside from the relational crash and burn, which is reason enough to mourn, it's abundantly clear that we've lost a very talented band. The accompanying odds & sods collection, Final Reflections of the Legendary Malcontent, will probably be of interest only to hardcore fans and completists. Compiling B-sides, live versions of previously released studio tracks, a few choice covers (Linda Thompson's exquisite "Withered and Died," Bruce Springsteen's "Tougher Than the Rest"), and the kind of flaccid studio noodling that should have never seen the light of day, it's the perfect argument for the "Next" button on your CD player or iPod. The real action here is on 30 Year Low, and it's fast and most decidedly furious. Like the best divorce albums, it offers sadness, pathos, and the electric thrill of great music forged in the crucible of pain. ~ Andy Whitman, All Music Guide