An eclectic and fascinating album of newly edited tracks by the prolific Boston Massachusetts collective, covering everything from gentle acoustic to thrash metal, indie, psych, electronica, krautrock and everything in between. There’s an explanation for this, as the seven tracks are taken from unreleased material recorded between 2007 and 2017, each rather different, and pulling the listener into contrasting worlds. Opener Dropped A Rock is a gorgeous piece of acoustic finger picking by Jeremy Pisani, with ghostly keyboard accompaniment. The title track also begins quietly like some country ballad, but soon picks up into a krautrock driven beats, strange electronica, and the growling, howling surreal voice of Shannon Ketch sounding like a hungry Captain Beefheart talking about food and campfires. Flex meanwhile has the groove of late-80s Manchester indie dance music with more krautrock. Black Lights veers between psych rock and heavy funk with a sinister horror movie style riff. Solved uses a cheesy drum beat with deeply whispering-gravelly narrative. Initials moves into more abstract keyboard jazz oddball squeaks, buzzes and experimentation, while closing track Prix Fixe descends into shouting dark thrash heavy metal mellowing later into sometning more like prog and Pink Floyd. So take your pick. Overall, a fine representation of the sheer breadth and prolific output of this group who reached their peak in the noughties, but can still throw out surprises. Out on Sunburned Hand Of The Man.
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