Reviews

Degelite

Attic Ted Starfish as Man LP

And the prize for worst band name goes to…ATTIC TED. Look, I was primed to really dislike this album. It doesn’t look like something I’d want to listen to. The name of the album is Starfish as Man, for chrissake! To my reluctant surprise, it’s not a bad needle drop after all. ATTIC TED has made a pretty charming post-punk record in the vein of ALTERNATIVE, MAGAZINE, or SUBWAY SECT, with some kraut-y avant garde elements pushing the affair towards the experimental end of the spectrum. Starfish as Man is sprinkled with spacey synthesizers and atmospheric, at times operatic vocal melodies. I presume that these folks have taken plenty of drugs to make music to take drugs to…or however it was that SPACEMEN 3 phrased it. Despite my negative predisposition, ATTIC TED has concocted a substantial freak-pop album that I can’t deny has a disturbingly catchy appeal.

La Race Je Me Rapproche de Mon Squelette LP

Recorded in an abandoned Belgian brewery, LA RACE presents brutally stark, molasses-thick rock-noise. Finding a place just north of black metal hell, the absolutely shredded vocals sound more like KK Null ran out of lozenges again. All jokes aside, this band means fucking business. LA RACE channels BILLY BAO’s furious conceptual gambits, but with the unalleviated disgust aimed inward, like a cancer. When they’re hitting all cylinders, the band conjures the disembodied hardcore of FUSHITSUSHA, slabs of sound sparking like old ghosts tangled in powerlines. Even when it seems subdued, Je Me Rapproche de Mon Squelette (translation: “I’m Getting Closer to My Skeleton”) never lets up on the intensity. An unmistakable howl into the void, you can hear the wind blowing through this album. It won’t keep you warm but it might keep you company.