Throughout a very productive run that spanned the entire 1990s, New York City's Versus delivered multiple albums and singles of noisy, guitar-driven indie pop that matured into something more jangly and subdued by the time their fourth album, Hurrah, arrived in 2000. Following that LP, new material didn't surface for another ten years, with the release of fifth album On the Ones and Threes in 2010. Nine years later, the four-song EP Ex Nihilo marked the first new work since. Despite the long gaps between releases, Versus' core sound remains intact and continues to grow on this brief outing. Somewhere in their development, the band's fervorous style wore into less anxious and more thoughtful songwriting, and their jagged hooks grew increasingly melodic. Still fans of fuzz and dissonance, Versus streamlined more than they mellowed, and that progression continues on Ex Nihilo. The collection begins with the bright and upbeat "Invisible Love." Trademarks of the band's sound -- fuzzy bass, upfront guitar lines, and a melancholic sense of melody -- unexpectedly melt into spacy bridges where Fontaine Toups' vocals are coated in distant reverb. "Bow and Arrow" and "Between the Hemispheres" are still rooted in the trappings of Versus' decidedly '90s-bred indie rock upbringing, but they branch out into synthy territory on "Gravity," with a growling bass groove guiding the song between its electronics-dotted segments. Though '90s nostalgia had cycled around to be a stylistic jumping-off point for new bands by the time of Ex Nihilo, the songs here operate outside of nostalgia completely. The band take what feel like natural steps forward both musically and conceptually, with more adventurous production and some of the most confident melodies of their career. Though it may be an indefinite number of years before the band's next full-length arrives, this sharp EP points to great things from that eventual album.
© Fred Thomas /TiVo