Monday, April 15, 2013

#840 Thee Oh Sees - Castlemania

Have these guys discovered some kind of magic portal into the collective mind of the past? How can they so effortlessly kick out 17 albums, give or take, in 7 years?

Are all those albums as packed to the gills with such thoughtless, effortlessly tweaky, muddy hookiness as this one? Channeling Guided by Voices channeling Frank Zappa via Ween via Deerhunter, the buzzy, garagey, psychedelic guitars just roll and roll, with the occasional wisp of the past dragging attached, a proggy organ solo here, a Creation cover there. By the end, when a flute interlude straight out of Selling England by the Pound and some downright folky harmonization come along it all winds around itself into some timeslipped drainspiral, as if the lords of the 60's are collecting on their soul-debt at last. Given the infernal, twisted subject matter and sound, this kind of bargain seems downright plausible.

These guys toured for a while with the similarly prolific, likemindedly garagey, equally suspiciously talented Ty Segall. Maybe they share some profane secret? Thee Oh Sees are considerably less fun than Segall's brand of couldntgiveafuckism, but there's still something undeniably intriguing about watching a band fling this much shit around and seeing so much of it stick 3.5/5

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