Fuck Buttons'
Tarot Sport is quite the departure from last year's
Street Horrrsing. The growls and throat-torturing vocals did not survive the evolution, but that's what made
Horrsing an album of schizophrenia; you wanted to enjoy both the wind chimes and the scream. Often the battles of pretty and the profane overwhelm the ears, but wasn't that the point?
Being an instrumental album,
Tarot Sport doesn't have to smash dishes to get your attention. In the time between these albums, Andrew Hung and Benjamin Powers have learned how to twist the knobs and push buttons to engage a more pleasureable listen. The songs dabble with dance and rave, so dance around the may pole if you want. This is noise taking pop to heart.
Take "Lisbon Maru". A friendly beat that Beyonce might reject, and Grizzly Bear could embrace. One thinks this shit is bananas, but by the five minute mark--soothed by the sounds of this pleasant audio daydream--the ambient squeals we've all come to love kick in. Before the ambiance, the song sounded like a vast field. The melody's e-bow-esqueness adds to the vision of giant fireflies hovering in place; blinking on and off like defective Lite Brites.
The rest of the album makes other noise releases this year look banal and worn. The nightclubbing anthem, "Flight of the Feathered Serpent", has a deceptive title. It would make one think of Stravinsky, not yelling to be heard by a bartender. Fuck Buttons might as well shoot foam cannons at the crowd during this tune. "Olympians" is another pelvis grinder, a soundtrack for that Cancun spring break where you get a butterfly tattoo'd on your lower back. The familiarity of electronic babble is all there, the stuff one hears in Merzbow, Wolf Eyes, the heavy hitters of explosive music. Without the screaming, Fuck Buttons wants listeners to focus on the grooves, to hear the fantasies music can help create.
Behind the various sound manipulations and landscapes, there are two dudes behind it all. Using their equipment like a painter with a brush, these two accomplish the feeling one gets while staring at a certain paintings by Miro or Picasso. It's still the same world as before, but slanted and pulsing and psychoactive. This is a great followup to
Street Horrrsing, where Fuck Buttons opens the doors to cleaner musical thoughts. There will be a day where noise and pop will frolic through a field of flowers, hand in hand.
For more on Fuck Buttons,
/fuckbuttons.
-Article by Brian RoweLabels: album review, dance pop, electronica, Fuck Buttons, noise, nosie noise snoisnsoienseoine, street horrrsing, tarot sport
This week, Real Estate hears some Atlas Sounds.
