Eating Us is out today. Go grip that shit! I wanted to go on and share my review originally written for LEO Weekly and was recently nixed and reworked for a bigger, more awesome full-page feature we’re doing coming in the next couple of weeks:
Black Moth Super Rainbow performs a difficult feat with Eating Us. The group is able to maintain the distinct, calculated sound that makes them easily recognizable while branching out to create a remarkably different album. The massive arsenal of antique analog equipment that defined BMSR’s first three albums remains in tact – the vocoder-saturated vocals of Tobacco, the thick and swirling novatrons and mellotrons that cultivated a general feeling of sunshine and old 8mm films about nature, etc. However, Eating Us showcases a more organic band, incorporating more acoustic instrumentation and mellow moods without disregarding the group’s traditional glitchy, Technicolor timbre. The syrupy strings that producer Dave Friddman fine-tuned on the Flaming Lips’ latter output makes its way onto beautiful floral pop gems like “Fields are Breathing” and the cinematic “Gold Splatter.” The expansive “Smile the Day After Today” sounds like the music Boards of Canada should’ve followed up Geogaddi with, but failed to. In short, Eating Us is a gorgeous, cohesive, enthralling, brain-melting psychedelic package – a record of remarkable imagination and accessibility that will unequivocally enjoy a very high place on my best of ‘09 list.
Don’t forget to check out our interview with Tobacco here, as well as some concert photos from our friends at Backseat Sandbar who went to their tour kick-off show in Lexington last week. I’ll be heading to the Southgate House in Newport (best venue in the world) to see them rip June 21st? Anyone else going?
I’m really excited to see these technicolor conjurers and super positive dudes on tour, since I always seem to miss them. Black Moth Super Rainbow will be super zipping through the lower 48 this spring to promote a new jam hive called Eating Us, out on May 26. And the tour kicks off here in Kentucky on May 19!
The aforementioned Lexington show is sponsored by my college radio alma mater WRFL, who have been booking some real kick-ass shows lately (going to see Ariel Pink tomorrow night, actually). Gotta step up your game, Louisville, unless you’re too depressed about last week’s loss to Michigan State or somethin’.
Tue. May 19 – Lexington, KY @ Red Mile
Wed. May 20 – Chicago, IL @ Bottom Lounge
Thu. May 21 – Madison, WI @ High Noon Saloon
Fri. May 22 – Minneapolis, MN @ Triple Rock Social Club
Mon. May 25 – Quincy, WA @ Sasquatch Festival
Tue. May 26 – Portland, OR @ Holocene
Thu. May 28 – San Francisco, CA @ Bottom of the Hill
Fri. May 29 – Los Angeles, CA @ Troubadour
Sat. May 30 – Costa Mesa, CA @ Detroit Bar
Sun. May 31 – Phoenix, AZ @ Rhythm Room
Tue. Jun. 2 – Austin, TX @ The Mohawk
Wed. Jun. 3 – Denton, TX @ Hailey’s
Thu. Jun. 4 – Little Rock, AR @ Sticky Fingerz
Fri. Jun. 5 – Nashville, TN @ Exit/In
Sat. Jun. 6 – Columbus, OH @ Circus
Some critics tend to take issue with an artist who lacks continuity on record. They may attack the artist for having some shade of a messy identity crisis. They might feel that a body of recorded work should be a cohesive submersion into an aurally cultivated landscape. I am not that sort of critic.
Sure, there’s a lot to say about continuity. An album such as, say, Lotus Plaza’s The Floodlight Collective is a great example of a cohesive record that sticks to a particular song structure and sonic timbre, and does it in a well-crafted fashion. However, there’s a fine line between cohesion and repetition or lack of inspiration. There’s also a fine line between ecclecticity and clusterfuck. Akron/Family, with the forthcoming Set ‘Em Wild, Set ‘Em Free, very intelligently carves an eclectic, surprising record that is not afraid to experiment with disparate genres – almost to an alarming level. It’s a textbook example of experimental music for people who might not like experimental music.
Akron/Family have dropped the freak from their freak folk flag, and in its place, introduced 11 remarkable tracks that explore every corner of cosmic American music – torch ballads to bucolic dirges, country rock to atmospheric anthems, sunshine pop and grating noise, Television and the Byrds, Sun City Girls and Sun Ra. Does this sound interesting to you? It should, Set Em Wild, Set Em Free is utterly imaginative.
“Everyone is Guilty,” the album’s opener, masterfully combines funk and post-punk. For a psych folk group, that’s pretty insane. From there, next track “River” provokes a sunshine-drenched subdued pop song with a twang. Eno-informed electronic flourishes swell and subside, as well as steel guitar and horn arrangements. It’s obvious that the Akron/Family loves music with no restrictions, plain and simple. What’s most surprising, aside from the genre jumping, is that fact that the group’s downsizing from a revolving roster to a trio yielded their most expansive album to date.
Now jump to “MBF” in the second half of the record. What begins as Steve Albini rock turns into a self-destructive porous membrane of sonic intensity that could fit very nicely on a Wolf Eyes or Prurient record. The structurally loose “Sun Will Shine (Warmth of the Sunship Version” is another highlight. This track is the closest resemblance to the group’s last effort Love is All, yet maintains the consistency of maturation and playfulness that makes Set Em Wild, Set Em Free so remarkable. The almost eight-minute “Gravelly Mountains of the Moon” is the real gem, though – a bombastic technicolor psychedelic anthem stocked with vast instrumentation and a pulsating over-the-horizon melodic quality. I like Akron/Family, but I didn’t see that one coming.
I can see the pure ambition of Set Em Wild, Set Em Free to possibly be a point of contention among critics and fans. I hope not. Set Em Wild, Set Em Free is smart and psychotic, almost refreshing to a fault, and showcases a band who has absolutely no comfort zone. Akron/Family have proven themselves to be pretty much fearless, and as a consequence, are propelled to a level much higher than simply another good offering from New Weird America. While some might find the record unlistenable at times, anyone with a relative appreciation of music and how it evolved should be compelled to give Set Em Wild, Set Em Free a fair shot, at least to hear an example of a truly brave and crafty collective.
Set ‘Em Wild, Set ‘Em Free hits the streets on May 5 and is available for pre-order on Dead Oceans.
Big day at the blog office. We’ve heard two amazing records just today, which is amazing considering that all three of us are total haters – the new Lotus Plaza, and this mysterious offering from a massive cluster of trans-Atlantic musicians called Flowers of Hell.
I don’t care if no one told these guys that it’s not the late ’90s anymore and post rock is no longer en vogue and/or what the kids are listening to these days. Fuck the kids. The Flowers of Hell’s Come Hell or High Water is one of the sickest, most moving collection of songs I’ve heard in some time, and is unequivocally the first great album of 2009.
Actually, that’s not fair. Flowers of Hell are not exactly post rock in the strictest sense. Sure, the music is instrumental and tends to gravitate toward tension-and-release compositions. Make no mistake, though, there’s a fresh, revelatory element in their sound. I saw someone describe the record as “classical music for shoegazers,” and I have to agree.
“Opus 66″ opens the record right, taking a few pages out of the Do Make Say Think book, cultivating a crescendo that you could only measure in axehandles. All the ingredients for chamber rock is here – strings, piano, lots of reverb, tremolo-saturated guitar, et al. Where Flowers of Hell carve their niche, though, is the incorporation of electronic flourishes and psychedelic boogie reminiscent of Spiritualized’s mid-career work. This makes sense, as good ol’ Sonic Boom performs on the album – not to mention members of British Sea Power, Bat For Lashes, Broken Social Scene, John Cale’s touring band, The Earlies, Guided By Voices, The Clientele, Do Make Say Think, The Hidden Cameras, The Ecstasy Of Saint Theresa, Tindersticks, The Early Years, and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. To add to the general radar blip this group exudes, band member and producer Greg Jarvis is a synaesthetic. Something to the effect of 3% of the world’s population has this gift: “The composing, recording, arranging, and mixing of Come Hell Or High Water was done largely by following timbre-to-shape synaesthetic visions. Synaesthesia is a neurological phenomenon where two senses are intermingled… With timbre-to-shape synaesthesia, sounds involuntarily trigger a translucent visual layer of moving shapes which follow a consistent audio-visual language. ‘I see sounds,’ explains Jarvis, ‘When I hear sounds, I see each timbre in front of me as shapes that follow patterns, often gliding, pulsing, and swirling with the rhythm and timing interlocking them all. Each timbre behaves differently, and that’s the main reason we’ve got such a variety of instruments on this album.’”
“The Inovcation” adopts a tribal rhythm with vintage electronic pings and pulses in the vein of the BBC Radiophone Workshop. “The Strength of String” is pure cinematic score – the foreboding mood of Morricone, but with a lot more melodic quality. “Bleumschen” ropes in a Faust/Neu motorik meets Loop-style fuzz sludge climax that totally slays me. Well-placed moments of dissonance (i.e. “Forest of Noise”) are peppered throughout the record as well, helping to establishing an overall experience as jarring as it is pleasant. The minimal beauty of Mogwai’s EP+2 is stretched across a full band canvas on album closer “Occasional Tears.” Considering the amount of musicians involved – 16 total – expect to hear a little bit of everything, including but not limited to: chamber pop, post rock, space, ambient, drone, and heavy fuckin’ metal. Basically, you’re an asshole if you don’t like Come Hell or High Water.
And zounds! Czech this video. The 8mm projections in this live performance really add the visual ambience that I wish more artists offer. I think this was recorded from their opening set for My Bloody Valentine. I might be wrong. Either way, my evening would’ve been a lot of better if the Flowers opened for MBV’s Chicago show instead of that shitty-ass Hopewell band.
Not to sound lame, but The Flowers of Hell offer everything I, personally, enjoy in my music. Fuck guitar solos, fuck wankery – make your music sound awesome. Sure, it’s nothing that you haven’t heard before, but Flowers of Hell offer the lush soundscapes, thick melodies, panned psychedelia known in the state of California to cause brain melting, and movements that, I would say, are rather triumphant.
Come Hell or High Water is out April 6 in Canada/The UK. Can’t tell if it will be available in the states or not, but you can grip it here.
Lotus Plaza is the solo outing of Deerhunter guitarist Lockett Pundt, and yes, it does sound like band mate Bradford Cox’s project Atlas Sound, but Pundt’s balmy atmosphere on The Floodlight Collective stands in direct opposition to Cox’s self-described fall/winter sound. Pundt, having been the inspiration for many of Deerhunter’s tender moments, proves to be wholly capable of producing his own brand of sedate nostalgia.
Keeping with the sock hopping doo-wop debuted on Microcastle, these ten tracks further explore the ambient tidings that narrated half of Cryptograms. We can hear Pundt drawing influence from Kompakt’s Pop Ambient series, especially through the evaporating synths and muffled incantations of tracks like “Antoine” or “These Years”. In addition to knowing when to pull the plug, these songs ascend their modest structures because of their spirited delivery that inhabits each layered track, saving them from turning stagnant. In truth, out of all Deerhunter related material, The Floodlight Collective is the most natural fit for Kranky Records thus far.
While these hazy reveries are the bedrock of the album, the standout moments are the ones with some kick to it. The blissful charmer “Quicksand” borrows the playful chaos and choral singing of Person Pitch and glues it to some over-exposed surf rock, creating an elevated garage rock hymn. Another highlight, the kraut-rock carousel “A Threaded Needle”, sounds like Neu! if they were Sunday drivin’ in the countryside instead of tearing up the Autobahn.
To our dismay, these cuts with a strong sense of identity out shadow the ones in a quandary. It can be difficult to seamlessly move from the bold tracks to the less confident ones like “What Grows?”, which evokes b-side Weird Era Cont., and without a full band, comes off sounding a bit irresolute. Floodlight Collective is fleeting, and hard to grab a hold of, but at the same time it is undoubtedly accessible, charming, and engrossing. If Brian Eno’s original intent for ambient music was for it to “accommodate many levels of listening attention without enforcing one in particular,” then Pundt’s debut effort is a success. There’s enough going on in the mix to warrant multiple headphone listens, but it gels together so effortlessly that it can serve as perfect background music as well.
The Floodlight Collective is available now on Kranky.
I think full contact St. Patrick’s Day would me more interesting, don’t you? Rather than simply pinching someone who wasn’t wearing green, you mow them down with your car. Because wearing green is so important, you see. It’s a good style.
Speaking of good styles, here’s a quick and dirty mix of music that traces the general trajectory of slamming car bombs all night – from the good time to the sickness. The picture above is, indeed, the Chicago River. I definitely recommend going to Chicago for St. Patty’s Day and also, surprisingly, Savannah, Georgia. Savannah’s celebration is huge and amazing (with better weather), and if you can avoid pockets of brodeo, you’ll have a really good time.
Prolific psych popsters Super Furry Animals will release their ninth studio album, Dark Days/Light Years, on March 16th via digital download on the band’s website. Details on the forthcoming slab have been scarce but the latest is that it will feature a guest vocal from Franz Ferdinand’s Nick McCarthy [Editor's Note: boooooooooo!] and include 12 tracks including one named “The Very Best of Neil Diamond.” Fans of “Cracklin’ Rose” are likely to be disappointed if SFA’s latest is anything like its past paeans.
The band’s last go-round was nearly two years ago with 2007’s Hey Venus! and frontman Gruff Rhys has more recently been busy with Neon Neon, his side project with Cincy native, Boom Bip [Editor's Note: yay!]. Yet another of the megabands spawned out of Creation Records’ heyday, Alan McGee plucked SFA for the label back in ‘95 and soon released Fuzzy Logic to critical acclaim. Reviewers frequently lumped them in with Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci as the torchbearers of “Welsh rock” in yet another example of why overeager attempts at categorization are often ill-advised in hindsight.
I like to now and then check out McGee’s blog over at the UK Guardian to see what the old Creation boss is listening to these days.With his keen A&R ear and provocative posts like, “Animal Collective:The New Hall & Oates?” (which predictably generated more flames than Mrs. O’Leary’s cow), he’s always a fun read.In reminiscing about his discovery of SFA, he claims that the band was intended to be the “Blur to my Oasis” referring to the top of the Brit-pop rivalry between the two bands.
Of course SFA never succumbed to the ridiculous swagger (although Mogwai couldn’t resist slagging Blur as “shite”) but has been quietly consistent and understated to the point of turning down millions from Coca Cola for the use of “Hello Sunshine” in its ads.McGee points to the band as woefully underrated but, as Carles at Hipster Runoff would say, “don’t yall h8 it when mainstreamers discover ur fave alt band?”
Hey Venus! was the band’s first of three contractual releases on Rough Trade.Response was overwhelmingly muted from fans unaccustomed to such a conventional album from a band known to twist Steely Dan samples pretzel-like into something like “The Man Don’t Give a Fuck.”Still, the album features some of their catchiest work to date including tracks like “Run-Away” which conjures up Beach Boys harmonies and a Ronettes backbeat.
The superficial reviews often compared the album to Fuzzy Logic though the two sound entirely different to me. There’s a span of over 10 years between the two releases and the nuance and maturity of Hey Venus! is apparent after repeated listens.While SFA’s albums in between have featured a daring willingness to experiment, their most recent release shows a restraint which says ‘yeah we can go there, but we won’t.’
Rhys has claimed that Hey Venus! was intended to be a “loud” album and that most of the more eclectic tracks were made part of his solo album, Candylion.There are even odds as to whether Dark Days/Light Years marks a natural progression or embarks on something entirely different.I’m sure Alan McGee is waiting with bated breath and hoping the next release transforms our planet into a “Super Furry” one.
After eight solid efforts over more than a decade it’s hard to know what would break the band into the bigtime alt rock world of, say, Miley Cyrus’ latest crush, Radiohead.“Hello Sunshine” was already floated on an episode of The OC and Zach Braff doesn’t have anything currently in production.But ask Thom Yorke what he thinks of being the new tween sensation and maybe superstardom doesn’t look all that appealing.
