Harry's Velvet Room

February 2003 · « All albums

The Fakeout, the Tease
and the Breather
Available now!

“…Canasta has been one of my favorite Chicago bands for some time now, as well as ranking near the top of my list for the smartest and hardest working groups in town.”
— Jim DeRogatis
full text

“…you need to hear this band… witty and whip-smart, that's Canasta. Deft arrangements and intricate polyrhythms are oh, so pretty.”
— Chicago Tribune
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“…masterful construction of hooky songs… Perhaps too polished for the hipster set, or enigmatic with their sporadic release schedule, Canasta holds their own against the big craftsmen of pop…”
— Epitonic
full text / recording session

“It has continued to write songs that fill themselves out in all the right places - offering quirky and charming, gritty and mopey succinctly… they’re that good.”
— Daytrotter
full text / recording session

“…a celebrated stalwart of ‘orchestral pop’… intricate, delicate, sometimes deeply emotional pop music.”
— Chicago Sun-Times
full text / cover photo

“…as versatile a rock band as the city has ever offered.”
— Illinois Entertainer
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“…deftly balances between being very much of its time and place and carving out something individual at the same time… The whole band has a great ear for performances that complement each other’s work and provides the icing on the cake…”
— Ned Raggett, AllMusic
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“Best of Chicago 2010… loaded with intricate yet accessible orchestral pop music.”
— Huffington Post
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“Rarely is new music categorized as being both immediately accessible and dizzyingly complex, but [Canasta] manage this feat so adroitly at times that it even makes Win Butler and Régine Chassagne look like rookies… manages to astound just as much on the first listen as it does on the fifth…”
— Adequacy.net
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“This stuff is almost prog-rock in its scope and ambition, hurtling along on a sea of dense instrumentation and atypical rock instruments… we love Canasta, and don’t see how anybody wouldn’t.”
— Chicago Tribune
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“Kitchen-sink indie par excellence, Canasta has a way with cacophony that is often as tuneful and melodic as it is bursting with ideas…”
— Time Out Chicago
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“…sounds so unbelievably good that no major label could improve it… This may seem like an exaggeration, but believe me, indiepop has seldom sounded so pretty as it does on this second album…”
— Heaven (The Netherlands)
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“Winner: Best of Chicago 2010 Fans’ Poll”
— The Deli
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“…The Fakeout, the Tease and the Breather is one of the best Chicago albums of the year.”
— Metromix / RedEye
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“The orchestrated pop on this local sextet’s new full-length is so perfect—every note falling into place with deeply satisfying craftsmanship—that you’ll swear you’ve heard it before. But you haven’t…”
— M. Kendrick, Chicago Reader
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“The tone is set for an album of open-air chamber pop that sounds like it wants to go haywire (and become a mess) but has been expertly subdued and shaped and is thus sublime… Pop rarely sounds this warm and natural when it’s this intricately composed.”
— Chicago Sun-Times
full text

“Chicago’s premier orchestral indie pop outfit… The lengthy break between this and their intriguing 2005 debut, We Were Set Up, allowed the band’s already dynamic sound to blossom further… melody that soaks deep into your skin before you know what happened… strikingly gorgeous songs…”
— IGN
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“At the start of Canasta’s new album, you can almost feel storm clouds parting for the 11 sunny, rollicking songs that lay ahead. For nearly a decade, the local chamber-pop group has managed to retain its ambition and melodic optimism, without ever coming across as winking…”
— The Onion
full text / cover photo

“…this is not a case of local overhype… a detailed and sophisticated body of songs… you will be wondering just like me: How is it possible that these guys haven’t got a major contract yet?”
— Pop+Rock (Greece)
full text

“The Fakeout, the Tease and the Breather is an example of a band working at the height of their powers… The lyrics are haunting, the melodies gorgeous, and the instrumental performances by everyone involved are powerful and evocative…”
— Music. Defined.
full text

“…they display both an ambition and a sense of range that any number of early 21st century American groups described in similar terms would be wise to follow… subtle… mesmerizing… stunning…”
— AllMusic
full text

“…Canasta’s strength has been mixing genres, ever so slightly, to keep it unpredictable… The band’s impressive orchestral pop, which really could catch on at any moment in a big, big way, will not cease in its power – listening again for the first time in a long while, I can’t believe I was able to put it down in the first place.”
— New City
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“Canasta has slowly made a name for itself in recent years, thanks to its inventive arrangements… (the band) has separated itself by layering its sounds while retaining remarkable catchiness… Canasta looks primed for a considerable breakthrough.”
— NPR’s “World Cafe”
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“Chicago’s Canasta play a rich and usually satisfyingly lush brand of orchestral pop… impressively diverse… rapturous…”
— PopMatters
full text

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