Category: Music

Please be politely warned, for what you are about to read should give your summer 2010 the soundtrack your ears are craving for as Monster Head Room, the debut album by Sacramento’s Ganglians is very much a contender for Record of the Year year at Crossfire.

Here’s why: this 3-piece simply have a knack of jamming a laid back beat, psyching it out until it almost breaks whilst at the same time creating a wonderful soundscape of Beach Boys infused psychedelic indie that is tinged with 60’s freak. It’s lush.

Their trippy mix of memorable, acid-tinged pop is delivered across this album from start to finish. Dark and mellow tracks such as ‘The Void’ do a very good job of instantly swimming into your veins. This personal favourite was re-recorded for the album and creeps into your consciousness enough to warrant that first morning tune that your mind plays you as soon as you open your eyes. They have that ‘cricket noise round the campfire’ shit on lock but singer Ryan Grubbs can also pack in catchy-as-hell pop melody’s throughout this album.

Highlights include the classic ‘Valiant Brave’, a mammoth track that builds into splendour much akin to Atlanta’s Black Lips whose psychedelic prowess (when on form) can be equally magical. It’s this magic though that makes this album so special as Ganglians bring with them a world that more addictive than any other record this year so far, a world that would be complimented by a dose of the best Mexican mescaline, a bath bong and a smoke machine.

They can also kick out the jams as proved on the banging ‘100 Years’ a song that one one listen made me think of bands such as The Butthole Surfers, they also bring garage-surf sounds in this collection of 13 tracks as present in ‘Blood In The Sand’ and there’s also Brian Wilson’s artistically innovative influence on tracks such as ‘Candy Girl’, another track that was rebuffed for this release.

‘Monster Head Room’ has everything you ever could have hoped for in an album at this time of the year and should give you the same buzz as your first listen to MGMT’s Oracular Spectacular. Look out for Ganglians as they are about to hit the UK for the first time ever this year and you would be foolish to miss them after hearing this record just once, yes, it’s that instant. Go feed your music habit right now and get stoked on the discovery, it will be well worth it.

Slack

Valient Brave by souterraintransmissions

The Void by souterraintransmissions

Ganglians – Blood On The Sand from jbls on Vimeo.

Sage Francis is back with a new album and this time he’s taken a very different route to his creating a sound unlike anything he’s put out before.

Sure he’s had guitar samples across his albums here and there, but this record sees him get rid of his traditional hip hop beats in favour of some stripped down acoustics and nods to punk in places.

Does it work? Well, for the most part it really does and surpasses,as a whole, his past two albums. His lyrics have always been there, regardless of the background, sharp, witty and easily quotable, but the use of real drums, even the dusty ones on Slow Man, really give him a canvas to highlight his vocals, something he does with aplomb.

It’s not a perfect album, there’s a slight dip in the middle but when he rounds it all up with the Yann Tiersen co-produced The Best Of Times [which you can hear below], that lull is forgotten, the beautiful melody emblazoning itself subtly on the listener’s ear drums. Bringing in the likes of Death Cab’s Chris Walla, Mark Linkous and members of Calexico and DeVotchKa was a bold move, but Francis has ridden the storm and come out the otherside with an album well worth listening to.

Abjekt.