Skittish Tragedy of the Commons. Release Date : February 28, 2006. Label: Independent. Rating: Great. (Screw points. To each his own!) Chills. My brain is in a thousand places at once on the "Intro" track. Slow and plodding. increasing to country for a split second, then blowing up into a thing where for a second you think you've anticipated/got the beat down and you're already starting to drum it out on the table in front of you, when suddenly it all goes haywire and you realize the beat barely has a structure. It does, but it's chaos. And there's noise, you get confused and feel like you should just go to bed and wait til it all calms down again. Cool. It seems like this is shaping up to be one of those albums that sounds really deliriously happy - filled with chimes and jumpity music and fun - yet there's something a little creepy about it all as well. Maybe it's because it seems like anything that's this peppy must have something up its sleeve, because valid musicians these days are supposed to be singing songs of destruction and sadness and evil. So it must be ironic. Right? There's hidden messages if you play it backwards or something. She punches me in the stomach with her smile... See? I guess that's sweet but it sounds like it would suck. Ticky ticky tick tock take your time. This is so cute. "Million Gray" cycles between a bippy-boppy opening and this hip modern dancerock chorus. Diverse dudes. I just noticed their website is iamskittish.com. That's super cute too. Aww. Skittish boys. Now there's a narration about a nervous girl. This really is quite sad. But it's adorable. Very good listen. Song of choice : Hard to choose! But I do like "Million Gray" a lot. -Andy Scheffler Elsewhere Skittish website Published : January, 2007.