Music / Pretty Balanced

From left to right: Forest Christenson, Judith Shimer, Parker Ross.

Pretty Balanced was a baroque pop/Dark Cabaret band from Columbus, Ohio formed in 2004. Its members were Jude Shimer (vocals, piano, cello), Forest Christenson (violin, drums), and Parker Ross (bass). The band briefly changed its name to The Alphabet before breaking up in 2010. Jude continues to make music under the name The Sneaky Mister.

Discography:

• Icicle Bicycle (2006)
• Conical Monocle (2008)
• Scarlet Starlet (2009) (as The Alphabet)

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Tropes found in Pretty Balanced's music:

• Depraved Bisexual: In "Genuinely Bad", it is mentioned that the singer's lying and manipulative ex liked both the ladies and the gentlemen.
• Gay Aesop: "Floating", a song about two male students who love each other, but are unable to confess their feelings to each other because of fear of judgment.
• Gender-Blender Name: Simon in "Simon's Sleeping" is actually a girl.
• Graying Morality: In "Genuinely Bad": "There's a point at which you realize that nobody is all bad."
• Growing Up Sucks: The character Erica in "Station Waggin" has to face adult life for the first time after moving away from home and starting college.
• Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: All their album titles are rhyming pairs of words.
• It Came from the Fridge: Downplayed. The couple in "Green Beans" has an expired can of generic-brand green beans in their pantry, and they're "both afraid to go near it".
• Last Chorus Slow-Down: Inverted with "Amtrax", which has a Last Chorus Speed Up.
• Love Nostalgia Song: "The Skin".
  I loved her then
  Like kids will love each other
  And want to get married
  When they don't have a chance.
• Lyrical Dissonance: Most definitely. They have "Cheap Drunk" (a "The Reason You Suck" Speech delivered to a cheating boyfriend), "Acid In[di]gestion" parts 1 and 2 (about a girl who dies from drinking acid), and Emyli (about a victim of abuse trying to hide her bruises), among others.
• Miniscule Rocking: They have many songs that are shorter than 3 minutes. "Ode to an Electric Fan" is only 1:14.
• Non-Appearing Title: Several, including "Cheap Drunk", "Floating", "Concertgoing", "Amtrax", "Hyphen", and "Survivor".
• Precision F-Strike: There's one in "Floating":
  Isn't it tough that those one out of ten have to suffer
  While everyone else can enjoy their free fucking in public
• Sole Survivor: The narrator of "Survivor" seems to be this, although it's never said what happened to everyone else in her town.
• Too Dumb to Live: "Acid In[di]gestion". Drinking chemicals from the school science lab out of curiousity? Sure, what a great idea that could not possibly go wrong!