mourn: ha, ha, he

Ha, Ha, He. has all the twists and turns of Post-Rock from its Chicago heyday bolstered by the melodic quirkiness of a new influence for the band, Throwing Muses. On Brother, Brother and Howard, we see MOURN through a pop lens: undeniably catchy, but intricately performed and still somehow heavy. This is a band that can play around with the pop format in a way that doesn't degrade their song-writing talent to the lowest common denominator. Not an easy task. Further on, the track Storyteller goes on it's own trip through downtempo drudgery, into a melodic bridge, and concludes with anthemic sing-screaming. On the equally challenging-yet-beautiful Second Sage, it becomes apparent that MOURN have begun to carve out their own niche and their songs are no longer fits of inspiration indebted to their heroes, but just the band being themselves.