The Answer Is In The Beat

True Blue: Solitary Queen tape (self-released, 2018)

August 31, 2018 at 10:59 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

The debut EP from recent Local Music Show guest True Blue (Detroit-based singer/songwriter Alexandria Berry) contains four incredibly powerful, hook-filled tunes about yearning, disappointment, and abandonment. Berry multi-tracks her vocals, guitar, and bass, while Dina Bankole (Secret Twins, Swimsuit, Casual Sweetheart) provides steady yet urgent backbeats. Berry’s songs are simply constructed yet scathing. There’s a whole lot of vitriol on songs like “Look What You’ve Done” and “Not Anymore”, and especially the nagging “Only If You Want To”, yet the songs don’t sound harsh or abrasive. They’re easy-to-swallow garage pop tunes, but the lyrics really dig into my heart. Currently on repeat, and it sounds better every listen. True Blue will be opening for Fred Thomas (who mixed and mastered this tape) at Outer Limits Lounge in Hamtramck on September 19, and I do not want to miss it! Stream and buy the limited cassette at Bandcamp.

Dean Spunt: EE Head LP (Radical Documents, 2018)

August 31, 2018 at 10:19 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

No Age’s Dean Spunt picks apart a few, sparse musical elements and recombines them in order to create very detached, quasi-musical pieces which nevertheless have some sort of forward motion to them. There’s some tenuously connected arcs of feedback, some nearly accidental-sounding drum crashes and sample bursts, and a starkly thumping electronic kick drum which seems to sleepwalk through it all. It’s divided into four pieces, but it’s essentially one thematic work. It does get a bit more kinetic at the beginning of the second side, however, where the beat picks up and the feedback becomes more wavy and forcefield-like. The following “Locker” mostly just sounds like a motor running, but there’s a very few brief moments where notes are faintly audible. This was originally performed at a gallery in New York last year, and it’s easy to imagine the artist just sitting at a desk with a few small machines in front of him in a nearly blank room.

Erica Eso: 129 Dreamless GMG (NNA Tapes, 2018)

August 31, 2018 at 9:05 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Erica Eso are a Brooklyn-based group who write experimental pop songs which generally sound breezy and groovable, even chilled out, yet they’re far from conventional or straightforward. Lead vocalist and composer Weston Minissali is also in Cloud Becomes Your Hand, a group known for cartoonish, Zappa-like prog-pop, and while it’s easy to recognize similarities in both band’s approaches, Erica Eso are far more in tune with radio-ready pop and R&B, and generally sound more polished and accessible… to an extent. The harmony-heavy “Gun-Metal Grey” could be mistaken for a chillwave track, if not for the showers of mutant sax and subtle rhythmic trickery. “Fire Is The Mouth” has a motorik beat which speeds up at the beginning, as well as heaps of unexpected guitar noise (courtesy of Delicate Steve). “Love-Gun” is much calmer, with echoing-thought duet vocals (including a momentary reference to eccojam favorite “Too Little Too Late” by Jojo). The two-part “Mirror Stage” is a total departure into abstract weightlessness, with sporadic electronic drums clattering around detached guitar howls. “Vaccination Free” inhabits similar territory, except it’s accompanied by a robotic choir, which at one point describes the group’s sound as “femmed-out microtonal synth-pop”. “House That’s Always Burning” ends this short album with another futuristic hyper-pop gem, blending proggy arrangements with neon synths and radio-ready vocals courtesy of Angelica Bess (recent collaborator with Chrome Sparks, Giraffage, Machinedrum, etc).

Grasses: Vision tape (self-released, 2018)

August 26, 2018 at 6:42 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Local trio making garagey indie pop (think Bad Indians, Rebel Kind, etc) with a slight Krautrock influence. The emphasis is on songwriting, for sure, but they get locked into tight grooves on songs like “Today”. Other songs (“First Sister”, “Psychic Reality”) are more concentrated bursts of energy, while there’s slower, dreamier ones like “Glass Box” and “Colors”. There’s lots of highlights here, but the mysterious, perfectly constructed “Wake Up” stands out the most, and the luscious “See Again” is too lovely for words. Tape/download available from Bandcamp.

E-Saggila: Dedicated To Sublimity LP (BANK Records NYC, 2018)

August 19, 2018 at 12:59 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Hard, relentless techno which also pauses to reflect on a crushed world (on tracks like “Glass Wing” and “Your Hole”). Detailed beats and cavernous textures, full of motivation but also meditating on hopelessness. “Viper” comes close to danceable power electronics, with distorted hissing seething under tight industrial techno beats. Almost painfully short at 30 minutes, but makes a massive impact.

JK Flesh: Wasplike EP 12″ (Inner Surface Music, 2018)

August 19, 2018 at 12:26 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

I’m finally going to see Godflesh this Wednesday (I’m 0 for 2 on seeing them so far, hope they don’t cancel this time) so I figure I should review Justin Broadrick’s latest EP. This one’s four tracks of banging techno with the expected amounts of searing feedback and stomach-churning bass. Definitely club-focused and functional, more so than usual for Broadrick, but it still has an appropriate amount of menace. Subversive club darkness which will fit in a set easily with Surgeon or Blawan or Randomer but will still leave a bit of that trademark Godlesh sting.