About

For all intents and purposes, Capillary Action is Philadelphia native and Oberlin College junior Jonathan Pfeffer accompanied live by keyboardist Sam Krulewitch, drummer Ricardo Lagomasino, and bassist Spencer Russell.

The music is hard to describe in simple terms: on Capillary Action's 2004 debut, Fragments (Pangaea Recordings), Pfeffer demonstrated an uncanny ability to dip into everything from melodic death metal rave-ups, fractured no wave-inspired crescendos, Latin rhythms, video game music, lazy alt-country pop, lounge jazz, new wave synths, and mathy melodies-- sometimes all within the same song.

But on Capillary Action's sophomore effort, Cannibal Impulses (Pangaea Recordings), Pfeffer discards the eclectic math rock stylings of Fragments for something completely fresh. Incorporating influences ranging from the meticulous nature of early 20th century classical and the satisfying crunch of chip tunes music to the insistent melodies of Javanese Gamelan and the heavily orchestrated soundscapes of Japanese noise artists, Cannibal Impulses is a harsh and challenging expedition into Jonathan Pfeffer's warped psyche.

Fragments is a nifty guitar record that plays well with different moods and feels, making for a cohesive whole that flows from track to track in an almost suite-like fashion. It's an assured debut, and Pfeffer is a clearly talented musician who bears watching to see where he'll take his craft.

- Joe Tangari, Pitchfork Media (#46 on Joe Tangari's Best of 2005 List)

It’s impressive that Pfeffer managed to make an instrumental guitar rock record with a lot of genre-changing and without a single style to call its own (there is no Capillary Action sound in the same way that there was a Don Caballero sound), all without ever entering jam band territory. Pfeffer’s songs are compact, and they’re full of unexpected changes rather than endless repetition.

- Charlie Wilmoth, Dusted

This is focused restlessness: this is wild instrumental rock oozing with fun!

- Abel Folgar, Transform Online

Capillary Action sounds like the product of a restless but focused mind. Ethereal, pleasant passages narrow into trance-inducing loops before opening up into sonic squalls. The music pulls you in, lulls you into a false sense of security, then smashes you over the head. In a good way.

- Alan Paul, Guitar World

Capillary Action in essence is a spectrum, a thermometer. One moment you'll be swooning on a lily pad to the soft sounds of twinkling pianos and gazing guitars. Then with a change of a track you'll be hanging from a thread in a volcano while all rhythm and melody explodes in your direction with metallic riffage that pulls you into the fire. Thankfully there is a lot of room in between these extremes in “Fragments”, an eclectic explosion of experimentation in genre bending.

- Zed, Scene Point Blank.com

The amazing part about this record is that every song is top notch and written of the highest quality. The jazz solos are that of a veteran, the metal riffs rival Iommi's genius, the song layers revel that of Amon Duul II. It shows an amazing maturity and production values, seeing as how it was recorded by a roommate, mixed over a phone by some other guy, and self-released.

- Jesse Raub, Punknews.org

A lot of reviewers complain that there are too many bands doing this sort of thing, but few do it with the restless, pursuant drive of Capillary Action. He is to be commended for his refusal to rest on feckless Slint-refiltering...This is a flailing, impossible to pin down album. It's the sound of a musician plowing through prog, metal, post-rock and jazz influences with a reckless, unnervingly swerving abandon.

- willcoma, Tiny Mix Tapes.com

Capillary Action's Fragments is a fine disc for indie music geeks to congregate around and collectively pick apart. It's also an album capable of making any so-called critic saucy enough to review it seem like a confused and babbling nitwit (yes, um..."seem"). Fragments is a fun album to listen to and a hard album to describe with any real degree of clarity, because it combines such a wide array of influences without much assimilation. This isn't the standard Neutral Milk Hotel meets Neil Young affair. This isn't Belle & Sebastian meets Sonic Youth. This is a whole lot of distinct styles that don't really "meet" at all, but somehow come together in a way that makes a fairly cohesive album.

- Brian Holm, 30 Music.com

'Fragments' is a refreshing patchwork of influences which are completely unapologetic in their juxtaposition and performance. In fact there are parts which are downright uncomfortable to listen to but given the choice between bland easy listening and truly innovative work like this there really is only one winner.

- Shane Blanchard, Tasty Fanzine.org

Although I can't quite put my finger on what strings the pieces of Fragments together -- it certainly isn't a solid basis in one style of music -- the consistent creativity, variety and unique textures all play a substantial role. Additionally, one can rarely predict what is to come, and Capillary Action's tendency to throw listeners for loops helps further solidify their shifty identity...There's no brief way to capture in words everything going on on Fragments, but it's an album worth checking out -- as long as you're ready for a colorful journey through a weird, but generally well-performed array of musical styles.

- Andrew Haak, Geekburger.com

See, I don't really know what Capillary Action sounds like. And neither does anyone else. I know you're looking for the one-term overarching genre description to help you catalogue and file Capillary Action away but you're not going to get one. The band embraces everything from early '80s British Metal, to Brazilian pop, to spazz punk, to alt-country, to Need New Body's brand of jazzy post-modern anarchy. So far, every review of Fragments has referred to them in completely different terms.

- Exadore, Born Backwards.com

Having recently reacquainted myself with my metal youth, the arrival of Capillary Action’s debut album came as a rather welcome surprise. Although somewhat scattered in realisation, its ambitous nature and the fact that it manages to jump between so many of guitar music’s signposts makes it an experience that never fails to surprise, upset or just plain confuse...Not that Capillary Action is at all a journey in sentimentality or a blase retrospective, in fact it’s quite the opposite - it’s like some mythical tome containing tabs of all the great guitar moments has been shredded, tossed in the air and replayed as it falls to the ground.

- Dale Harrison, Cyclic Defrost.com