Patois Counselors The Optimal Seat LP
I loved the last LP from these art damaged miscreants; its wild snarl and catchy slump brought to mind strange adventures in anyone-can-do-it-core, a lineage of SWELL MAPS-ian slither. This one moves with a different feeling, sort of less imminent collapse pop rambunctiousness and more a tense architecture of synth and guitar scrawl that maybe matches our unnerving era, relentless horror mapped out in a series of flatlining rhythms. It somehow reminds me of the RAINCOATS Kitchen Tapes meets TOTAL CONTROL?! Something about it is less immediately compelling to my mind—the sort of collapse in on itself pop fervour of the first record was a fever dream whereas this one is much more spectral somehow?! It’s a great record, but feels more distant music from the room next door than the immediate savage hammer to my mind of the first. I think this will become a record I return to relentlessly but right now it’s more of a question mark.