Songs of The Week: "Suns Irrupt", "The Undiscoverd First", and "Helix"

Lot's of cool stuff lately, so I'm going to throw a few things at you this time around. While I wasn't a huge fan of the new Neon Indian, Era Extrana, it does have a few err, polished tracks. One of the more exciting and sensory engaging songs is the sublime, “Suns Irrupt”. With a robust and textural percussion back bone and a swell of slightly queasy yet soothing synth tides, it's a joy to listen to. While much of the album is too cluttered and messy to discern, “Suns Irrupt” is distinctly and properly layered. Alan Palomo's voice is sedate as usual, but in this case betrays a sort of mystic echo in the background. It seems steeped in a fantastical kind of history, yet is carried along by an overtly tech oriented sci fi psychedelic beat. I like it.

The new Feist album, Metals dropped pretty recently, and to the shock of no one, it's pretty good. What's a little more surprising is the territory she traverses, in her own delicate sort of way in “The Undiscovered First”. It starts off so restrictive, so frail and uneasy. Feist sings with a inalienable confidence. She conveys hints of sweetness slightly mixed with just a touch of scorn and contempt. The melody in turn timidly stalks her voice; scratchy and haphazardly arranged guitar strings and snake rattles keep their distance from her at first. It takes a partly domineering yet supportive horn section to kick in to match Feist's particular brand of restrained passion and for the arrangement to rise to the occasion- and then does it ever. The guitar expands with gruff reverb, and Feist starts channeling some serious Dead Weather and together the whole song just seems dauntingly fierce- especially verses it's diminutive origins.

The new Justice album, Audio Video Disco, is finally approaching, and the few brushes we've had with it so far are extremely promising. Their hooks just keep getting better, and so far “Helix” is the best. Aiming to be more arena rock oriented than dance club pop, “Helix” fits the bill, with a highly punctuated and rapid fire guitar hook that's way too much fun. A ghostly echo of a voice that would apparently rather dance than haunt you makes it all the more goofy and delightful. With the song's conclusion, Justice gracefully takes their hook and transitions it from dirty guitar staccato, to exclamatory and dramatic keyboard finale. So much fun!

Review: Neon Indian- Era Extrana

Era Extrana, the new release by Neon Indian, is not awful. A disclaimer as such is necessary as I'm going to spend most of my time here explaining all the things that are wrong with it. Again, the album is by no means a complete misfire, like some ill conceived experiment that births a wretched creation terrorizing an unsuspecting lot of villagers- although that is sort of the imagery that formed in my head. It's just that it's most pronounced attributes are also it's most glaring flaws, concealing the more admirable aspects. However I cannot claim Era Extrana to be a great, or even good album either, as Neon Indian has failed to expand or improve upon the shaky yet promising ground the broke in their first LP, Psychic chasms.

Ultimately I feel as if a thorough and deeply objective analysis of the counters and crevices of Era Extrana is sadly unwarranted when all that is required of me to say is that this album suffers from the same nearly crippling aliment that Physic Chasms did. That being a deeply rooted lack of confidence in their abilities as musicians coupled with their grotesque over indulgence as editors and post production hucksters. This album is at its core comprised of competent, and occasionally alluring tech-synth beats, only to be smothered and congested by an obtrusive and offensive amount of musical detritus. The melody is strangled and snuffed out by a tangled and ill defined web of haze and subterfuge in the form of obtrusive distortions in bloated numbers. I mean that last part rather literally as the basic beat of some of their tracks show real promise. The endearing and remorseful few seconds of their opening interlude, “Heart: Attack”- which is made all the more impressive and expressive since they composed it via canned 8 bit audio tracks provides hints of grandeur and importance. The inquisitive parading scales of their lead single, “Polish Girl” are equal parts superficially catchy and mentally stimulating- and in just the right balance. Clearly Neon Indian can at times, construct a good tune. Why they feel the need to consume these tunes in an unbalanced tide of post production bullshitery is distressing as both of these tracks quickly loose direction awash in a mess of distorted measures. Before one dissents and says there is no basis to say this is all egregiously applied after the fact and argues that much of what you here is performed in real time- stop. It's not. I have seen Neon Indian live, or should I say I have had the pleasure to see Neon Indian live. Their songs are significantly striped down; considerably leaner and more linear. The simplicity that they seem “restrictively” forced to convey is so much more appealing than their sloppy mosaic approach to music.