After 24 years and 10 albums, we’re still trying to figure out Trans Am. A statement of misguided complication or exaggeration? Maybe. But the trio—guitarist Phil Manley, bassist/keyboardist/vocalist Nathan Means, drummer Sebastian Thomson—hasn’t exactly made comprehension easy considering its non-linear progression, lack of canned press statements and refusal to submit to expectation. Trans Am’s throw-at-a-dartboard-and-see-what-sticks approach notwithstanding, the band finds itself with a 10th album in its laps. Volume X (Thrill Jockey) leans toward the streamlined sensibility of 2007’s Sex Change, snidely and playfully existing somewhere between krautrock, post-rock, electro-rock, punk rock and other prefix-rock. Trans Am will be guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week. Read our new feature on them.
Means: A lot of thought goes into brains. People know what they look like, how they smell and which ones taste good, but nobody seems to know how they work. I know this because there is something wrong with my brain. Sometimes it freaks out. I went to a neurologist, but she just juggled different prescriptions and told me to Google things if I had questions. There are other treatment options like getting a pacemaker thingee attached to something near your throat. Or you could have a dog around. They at least know when your brain is going to go off. After a few years, I talked with a friend of mine. He looks at rat neurons on a screen in a laboratory. “You know,” he said. “No one really knows how they work.” Thank you!
