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**Quasi - Featuring 'Birds' ★★★★☆**

The indie rock landscape lost one of its most endearingly dysfunctional couples when Quasi called it quits in 2020, but their 1998 masterpiece "Featuring 'Birds'" stands as a monument to what happens when romantic chaos meets musical genius. Sam Coomes and Janet Weiss didn't just break up a band when they divorced – they severed one of underground rock's most fascinatingly volatile creative partnerships, leaving behind a catalog that reads like a musical diary of a relationship slowly combusting in real time.

"Featuring 'Birds'" captures Quasi at their most cohesive, which is saying something for a duo whose entire aesthetic seemed built around beautiful discord. This is lo-fi indie rock that sounds like it was recorded in someone's basement – because it probably was – but don't mistake the DIY production values for amateur hour. Coomes' vintage keyboards, ranging from wheezing Farfisa organs to tinkling toy pianos, create a sonic palette that's equal parts nostalgic and unsettling, while Weiss pounds out rhythms with the precision of a metronome and the fury of someone working through some serious personal issues.

The album opens with "Birds," a deceptively gentle track that lulls you into thinking this might be a pleasant folk-pop excursion before Coomes' vocals – delivered in his trademark nasal whine that somehow manages to be both irritating and endearing – pull you into darker territory. It's a perfect encapsulation of Quasi's ability to make the mundane feel profound and the profound feel wonderfully absurd.

"Two by Two" stands as the album's undisputed masterpiece, a six-minute epic that builds from whispered confessions to full-blown emotional catharsis. Weiss' drumming here is particularly spectacular, shifting from delicate brushwork to thunderous fills that punctuate Coomes' increasingly unhinged keyboard work. The song feels like watching a relationship implode in slow motion, which, given the band's history, it probably was.

The real revelation is "Smile," where Quasi strips away all pretense and delivers something approaching a conventional pop song – if conventional pop songs were written by people who've clearly spent too much time listening to obscure German electronic music and early Velvet Underground bootlegs. Coomes' melody here is genuinely beautiful, floating over Weiss' steady pulse like a half-remembered lullaby.

Quasi emerged from the ashes of Sleater-Kinney's early days, when Weiss was still finding her footing as the powerhouse drummer she'd later become. Her partnership with Coomes – both romantic and musical – began in the early '90s Portland scene, where everyone seemed to be in three different bands and dating someone from a fourth. Their early albums were scrappy affairs, but "Featuring 'Birds'" marked their evolution from promising side project to essential listening.

The musical DNA here draws heavily from '60s garage rock and '70s art punk, filtered through the lens of '90s indie sensibility. Think Suicide's electronic minimalism meets The Kinks' melodic sensibility, with a healthy dose of Pacific Northwest rain-soaked melancholy. Coomes' background in various underground acts gives him an encyclopedic knowledge of forgotten keyboard sounds, while Weiss brings the rhythmic sophistication that would later make her one of indie rock's most sought-after drummers.

"Jackie O" showcases their gift for turning historical figures into personal metaphors, while "Catch" demonstrates their ability to make three chords sound like a complete emotional statement. The album's sequencing is particularly smart, alternating between moments of gentle introspection and explosive release in ways that mirror the emotional roller coaster of a failing relationship.

Today, "Featuring 'Birds'" feels like a time capsule from an era when indie rock still felt genuinely independent, before algorithms and streaming services homogenized underground music into easily digestible playlists. Weiss went on to become a rock icon with Sleater-Kinney and later Wild Flag, while Coomes continued making music under various guises, but neither quite recaptured the specific magic they created together.

The album's legacy lies in its proof that the most compelling art often emerges from the most uncomfortable places. "Featuring 'Birds'" is the sound of two people trying to make beautiful music while their world falls apart around them – and somehow succeeding brilliantly.