A guise of former Hail Social singer Dayve Hawk (also known as Memory Cassette and Weird Tapes), Memory Tapes specializes in low-budget electronica for underdogs trying to survive yet more disappointments. Player Piano‘s handcrafted tales of loneliness and bad romance draw quiet power from Hawk’s charmingly reedy vocals, while the layered synths and other scruffy keyboards evoke subliminal longings and anxieties. The snappy guitar of “Sunhits” suggests Hawk could choose to churn out more accessible fare, but the dreamy ingenuity of ?”Worries” argues for his hazier path.
