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Spirit of the Beehive take a dark ride on "Entertainment, Death"
Blatantly disregarding the double-live principle of rock school on their fourth full-length, Spirit of the Beehive instead take the listener on a dark ride. The record is called Entertainment, Death and with its cover image of faceless funhouse patrons being beckoned into the mouth of madness of an amusement ride's entryway, a mouth belonging to a cartoonish but menacing red-eyed devil, we're given a hint of what's to come inside--a carnival ride full of herky-jerky twists and turns.
Entertainment, Death moves restlessly between ambient floating-in-space "tunnel of love" passages like heard in the song above and whiplash passages as illustrated below, similar to when the midway ride's bumper car rolls over a relay switch illuminating a skeleton or some other scary creature leaping out of a casket and lunging straight at you, accompanied by a loud cackling laugh and a spray of hissing steam.
Despite the seeming stream-of-consciousness of much of Entertainment, Death the album is organized around a conceit that makes thematic sense out of its through-composed structure. Album opener "Entertainment" begins in medias res and ushers the listener through a sonic birth canal of rumbling drones, squealing test tones, scuttling percussion and intense ethereal whooshing. But relative calm then descends with a loping rhythm and chirping birds and a pastoral folk song melody with harmonized vocals informing us that "I woke up when I heard the blow / heading east towards KSMO" a calm that's broken only slightly by the entrance of glitching synths and a warped string section.
Guitarist/vocalist Zack Schwartz and bassist/vocalist Rivka Ravede have explained elsewhere that while on tour for 2018's Hypnic Jerks they suffered a tire blowout in route to a gig in Kansas City, Missouri (a tour that had them opening for the band Ride no less) which led to them imagining a scenario where they perished in the aftermath of a car accident and where their new album would be conceived as a series of fleeting thoughts and musical fragments and distant memories triggered in the split-second leading up to their imminent death occurring on the last track fittingly called "Death."
More than just an inner space travelogue the record also serves as a reckoning of sorts for lives spent creating and consuming "content" (a.k.a. entertainment) with the Beehive crew expressing some ambivalence and admitting "I regret some choices I've made / entertainment only remains / while I keep descending / who will decipher the pain from the lie?" and between the bookmark tracks of "Entertainment" and "Death" the album delves into a sonic and lyrical purgatory for the rest of its running time, descending into Hell for the penultimate multi-part "I Suck The Devil's Cock," a song that doesn't so much advocate demonic fellatio as it advocates demonic fellatio used as a metaphor for the Faustian bargain of selling one's soul for rock 'n' roll or of serving the servants by serving new content to the modern-day deity of the Internet server.
Just in case you're not finding it easy, one good way to get on the wavelength of Entertainment, Death is to read up on what the Buddhists call "bardo"--intermediate, indeterminate state of non-being (based in becoming vs. being) like the twilight state between wakefulness and sleep (a.k.a. hypnagogia) or the cosmic void between life and death or between death and rebirth. Spirit of the Beehive cross the dharmata bardo or "luminous void" described in the Tibetan Book of the Dead with Guy Debord's Society of the Spectacle as represented by the record's shifting tempos, warped pitches, flanged timbres and vacillations between chaos and stillness where "enough is never enough" and where the "remember[ed] promise of a future" is replaced by an eternal present.
Both the quotes directly above are taken from "There's Nothing You Can't Do" which transforms a cheap ad slogan into an aspirational mantra and a luminous void ("Property of Void Industries") and for almost two minutes it comes on like a song you'd hear at a sexy alien discotheque--with a slinky groove wedded to a strangely alluring detuned trumpet and wispy vocals that declare the merits of a "heavy hand, middle class / chemical in a bag / all I want; love me all the time" before lifting off into s hook at 1'13 that's sublime enough for one to overlook the quiet desperation of lyrics like "Could it all be in my head?" and "I made my bed, I'll lie in it"--a song that just about any other band would leave untouched and promote as their radio-ready new single. But instead SotB drown their potential hit song in the bathtub toward its end, submerging it under waves of feedback and distortion and paranoid-sounding screaming that promises "I'll be your friend" over and over again but which I usually hear as asking "Are you afraid?"
And so with Entertainment, Death the Philly-based three piece (reduced from five on their last LP; Zach and Rivka are joined here by multi-instrumentalist Corey Wichlin) Spirit of the Beehive have assembled fragments of their musical past--ranging from early shoegaze and noise-based music to sample-based collage and dreamy indie rock and electronic experimentation--into a cut-and-pasted musical journey that combines the aforementioned elements with other influences (e.g., vaporwave) resulting in a manifesto for the end times that beckons you to enter the void and to buy their band t-shirts and art works. (Jason Lee)
The Spirit of the Beehive
Queen Mob bring on the "Pop Sickle"
Queen Mob are a two-piece from Psychedelphia, who as individuals go by the names Beth and Colin, and if they placed a band personals ad it'd probably read something like "freak-folk-shoegaze-vaporwave band seeks absolutely no one because we don't collaborate and we don't cooperate."
<a href="https://queenmob1.bandcamp.com/track/pop-sickle">Pop Sickle by Queen Mob</a>
Over the past year Queen Mob have released one album and one EP (Easy, Liger and Against A Pale Background) and three singles ("Comeback," "Sidecar," and "Pop Sickle") the last of which I'm declaring to be the best runaway-carousel/broken-calliope music I've heard since MGMT's "Lady Dada's Nightmare".
<a href="https://queenmob1.bandcamp.com/track/sidecar">Sidecar by Queen Mob</a>
In their recorded work to date the band have already demonstrated impressive range by alternately sounding like an inebriated Beck, an inebriated Swervedriver, and an inebriated Jandek (so, just, Jandek). Or maybe instead of inebriated they're just experimental. It's not really our business how they get to that place.
<a href="https://queenmob1.bandcamp.com/track/comeback">Comeback by Queen Mob</a>
Beth herself describes the single above as "haunted dystopian electronic music" and that strikes me as pretty accurate for their lastest music. So hop on to the merry-go-round and hold to your horse pole becuase Queen Mob will take you on a ride. (Jason Lee)
Queen Mob
Ghost Funk Orchestra soundtracks the "Asphalt Homeland"
If the long awaited Cagney & Lacey movie ever comes to fruition (sorry, I don't consider the TV movies canon) I'm going to immediately start an online petition to make "Asphalt Homeland" the opening credit music--played as the camera slowly pans over the asphalt homeland of Lower Midtown Manhattan until landing on our two sometimes harried but always resolutely determined lady detectives. And sure, the new single by Ghost Funk Orchestra is a good deal less boob-tube bouncy and peppy than the original TV theme song, but that's good because it'll help Cagney & Lacey make the transition to the big screen with the help of some dramatic, cinematic music.
&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="https://goldenrulessoul.bandcamp.com/track/ghost-funk-orchestra-asphalt-homeland"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Ghost Funk Orchestra - Asphalt Homeland by Ghost Funk Orchestra&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;
Of course this isn't to imply that bandleader/songwriter/arranger/producer Seth Applebaum only writes music appropriate for a Cagney & Lacey type show. To the contrary, Seth is a one-man "library music" machine whose music could just as easily be used to score urban dramas, medical dramas, gangster epics, or even wild comedies and super action films but with a distinct golden-era approach harkening back to a time when jazz and funk and rock and Latin music and psychedelic music (and many other genres besides) often shared equal space on a single soundtrack.
Take the song called "Fuzzy Logic" for example (see video above) which stays true to its title by rejecting Boolean either/or logic in favor of multiplicity and suggestive ambiguity. It starts off sounding like the dramatic opening moments to a classic spy soundtrack or a caper movie with its dissonant stabs of brass and syncopated hi-hat cymbal--not to mention how the music video's use of color gels and multiple exposure give it a strong Bond pre-credit sequence vibe--before sliding into a groove that's laid back enough to be Sade-approved but with some vaguely uneasy lyrics (and a brief Bill Withers "I know" interlude, may he rest in peace) sung to enchanting effect by regular vocal collaborator Romi Hanoch (PowerSnap). And then about one minute in the song takes another turn with a breakdown section featuring flamenco-style clapping and dub-like echo and surf guitar reverb before circling back to the second verse and then later ending with a concise but still pretty epic solo outro traded between baritone sax and flute.
Seriously, put this song on in the car next time you're cruising around and it's guaranteed to make you feel like a total badass even if you're just heading to 7-11. Or put on almost any GFO song because they rarely skimp on the funkiness, the ghostliness, or the intricate orchestrations. And did I say "one-man show"? In reality, Ghost Funk Orchestra is more like a ten-to-twelve-man-and-woman machine because you know it can't be easy making music this elaborate alone and especially not if you plan to play live. And by the way seeing GFO live is a wonderful thing that will presumably happen again someday soon.
So, if you lack familiarity with the Ghost Funk prior to "Asphalt Homeland," their most recent full-length An Ode To Escapism (2020) is a good place. The album features a shift array of musical emotional hues that still manage to flow together as a continuous whole--more that fulfilling the promise of the album's title. And just case you happen to forget the stated purpose of the album while listening there's an intermittent GPS Lady voiceover reminding you that "as long as your headphones are on...you're safe, and hidden" and it never hurts to be reminded of that. (Jason Lee)
Mars Rodriguez: Up until "The End"
Mars Rodriguez is an independently-operating, Los-Angeles-based, Nicaraguan-American singer-songwriter-producer-multi-instrumentalist and so far her early releases are living up to that multi-hyphenate description. Mars released her first full-length last September, Don't Wait for Nothing, and over its 30 minutes you never have to wait too long for some new sonic wrinkle or other musical ingredient to be thrown into the mix which makes for a compelling and propulsive listening experience. And while I may be reading too much into things here, I could see how this restlessness could possibly derive in part from being part of a population displaced by political crisis and state violence.
If forced to come up with my own original hyphenate to describe Mars Rodriguez's music I think I'd go with "Café-Tacuba-meets-Shirley-Manson-meets-Massive Attack" because that at least hints at the stylistic eclecticism and the multilingualism and the mix of grungy guitar, power pop melodies, trip hop ambience, dub- and psych-inspired production, rock-en-espanol rhythms and drum machine rhythms. It's one of those albums meant to be taken in all at once in full, a continuous sonic journey.
Take the album-opening instrumental track "Tous Les Jours" for example, which starts off with almost a full minute of ambient planetarium-style celestial sounds before launching into a funky percussion loop that wouldn't sound out of place in a Chemical Brothers song and then a fuzzed-out zig-zagging melody that brings to mind Radiohead's "Myxomatosis" or it does to my mind at least. After a minute or two the fuzzone starts to disintegrate and get swallowed up by swirling echo effects. Then the whole thing topples and transforms into a slower, stripped down groove--but with vibrating tones and reverb-drenched voices still hovering overhead before fading out to sounds of distorted radio signals and sine waves.
From there each subsequent song on Don't Wait for Nothing explore a new direction or two. One of these directions is the "potential pop crossover hit" and there would seem to be at least a couple on the album--like "Now" with it's singalong refrain and motivational message and steady build to a big finish--but always with a quirky touch or two to keep it more on the alternative side of things. Mars's new single released on Friday ("The End") continues down this path of pop music with frayed edges--evoking Brian Eno one moment and Republica the next, with the listener exhorted to "exit your mind". And with all this talk of ends and exits, here's to new beginnings because I'll bet Mars Rodriguez has some more interesting ideas in store. (Jason Lee)
Mars Rodriguez
Triptides reverberate with Alter Echoes
Take a listen to "It Won't Hurt You" off the Triptides' new album Alter Echoes and you're sure to feel free as a bird flying eight miles high over the Sunset Strip that is until your strawberry colored alarm clock wakes you from your slumber and you rise from your mushroom-imprinted pillow to face another rainy day.
While I can't say for sure if that's a Rickenbacker guitar being played on the track it sure as heck sounds like it (note: now confirmed to be a Ric 360!) and either way these Angelinos have captured a certain classic LA World vibe and sound on the entire album that would no doubt have Russ Meyer salivating all over his ascot to hire these boys as the house band for the Hollywood bungalow party scene in his new movie titled The Immortal Pussycat Beyond the Motorpsycho Valley of the Mudhoney Vixens Kill Kill! were he not a long dead mazophiliac.
So, not to dwell on this one song but it's also got bongos, or congas at least, and about 25 seconds into the thing a maraca and a guitar countermelody enter simultaneously with some sweet stereo separation and really the album is chock full of these nice arranging and production touches so you can use it to show off your hi-fi system to your honey and everybody wins.
For example you'll hear the old we trick of feeding a vocal part through a Leslie speaker on "Do You Ever Wonder?" and then a little later the sudden transition to a half-time Floydian blissed out freakout towards the end of "Let It Go" which then reverts back to its original upbeat jingle-jangle by its conclusion and also there's the day-glo smeared psychedelic coda to "Hand of Time" which is groovy too.
On its back half the album mellows out significantly (but what so you expect from the B-side) before the Triptides decide to end things on an up note with the frug-ready "Now and Then" sending their more dance-inclined patrons home happy. So hey, if any of this sounds appealing the Deli says ch-check it out! (Jason Lee)
Published: March 25, 2021 |
Triptides