It’s the year of the rabbit in more ways than one.
First, the debut recording from the Arlington rock outfit Playtime Rabbit came out 15 years ago, when the bandmembers were late teenagers fresh out of high school. They yanked Year of the Rabbit a while back but reposted the EP onto Bandcamp just recently.
“Some of the songs seemed a bit naïve in nature,” said 30-year-old Chris Bell, who fronts the band with younger brother Jordan Bell on drums and Jordan Oliver Hall on bass. “I was a suburban kid at the time. We’ve grown as a band, and now it seems OK to add the EP for listeners along with our earlier releases,” including their lone album, 2018’s Radiohead-esque Primitive Dream, plus a few singles, demos, and five other EPs.
Now, the occasion for all this maneuvering is a new Playtime Rabbit EP. In the Glass Ring was recorded at Green Audio (Son of Stan, Sally Majestic, Keegan McInroe) in Fort Worth and was mixed and mastered by Brandon Keebler, a high school friend who’s worked with Playtime Rabbit since the beginning.
“With this EP, I want listeners to see that we are comfortable experimenting with different styles,” Chris said. “I think this is most apparent between the Primitive Dream record and the new EP.”
College, family, and other life changes — along with the pandemic — slowed down Playtime Rabbit considerably, but at the moment, Chris feels like they’re in a good place.
“I like what we are doing right now as a band,” he said. “We’ve found a cohesive voice to clarify our artistic vision and work. We’ve got more time to play and write together then we once did.”
Now fathers and professionals, they reminisce about the good old days of playing venues like The Aardvark and The Cellar, both on Berry by TCU, and also Lola’s. The guys are just as excited about their EP-release show at The Cicada Friday.
Photo by Kevin Contreras
Playtime Rabbit’s sound could be classified as shoegaze, with lots of dense sonic themes and twinkling guitar picking. Lyricist Chris takes his inspiration mostly from sci-fi novels — he’s a seventh-grade English teacher, after all. “The Shrike” comes from Dan Simmons’ 1989 novel Hyperion, and Robert McCammon’s postapocalyptic Swan Song from 1987 also figures its way into some of the strophes. Everything is told with Keatsian aplomb.
“My body is pierced upon the final tree,” Chris sings on “The Shrike,” “Now, I have all the time I need / The Shrike has come / To take us home / The Shrike has come / To take us home / Embrace the pain / Don’t turn away.”
With the new EP, Playtime Rabbit expects to hit many more stages and is even embarking on a mini-tour through Oklahoma and Austin, then back to North Texas.
Bassist Hall was succinct: “The trajectory of the band is to play more shows, write more, and gain a bigger following.”
Playtime Rabbit
8pm Fri w/Darstar and Assisted Living at The Cicada, 1002 S Main St, Fort Worth. $12. All ages.
