What The Cookie Jar Complot really show with release is how thin and blurred the lines could be between different genres, when we think of Garage Rock, usually a harsh sound with distinct low fidelity comes to mind, and when we think of Post Rock, a different sound comes to mind, one with expansive layers of reverbed guitars and driving drums. The Cookie Jar Complot are a Luxembourgish songwriting duo, composed of Sven Schmeler and Gilles Glesener, and their band name is iconic.
After the release of their debut EP, Caviar Capital in 2021, and after a year of gigging, they are here with a fiery double-sided single that blurs the lines between genres quite neatly. Cookies, the side A off the single is an expansive Post Rock anthem. Full of writhing guitar melodies, and open pad sounds that introduce a great space. A really noticeable thing is how all sounds are made using guitars. Layers upon layers of overdriven, chorused, distorted, and sometimes clean guitars are fitted one on top of the other producing an orchestra of guitars reminiscent to that of Jimmy Page. It would be very interesting to see the duo attempt to play such an ambitious arrangement on stage. A cacophony of hopeful, colorful, and driving Post Rock. The B side, The Cookie Jar Complot, is a different story altogether. More directly melodic and with bolder harmonic choices, the symphony of guitar persists but to a more fractured and less airy background. The drums sound more upfront and adventurous, the guitars are less noodly and more riffy. The classically tinged composition, featuring harmonic minor sounds and diminished triads, is intriguing and uncommon in a Garage Rock arrangement.
The sounds that the duo creates manage to swiftly straddle the border between Garage and Post Rock quite eloquently. Double that with tasty guitar solos, lush tones, and beautiful playing, and we have no complaints whatsoever. Give us more!
