Record Review – Great Dane?

Efterklang – Parades LP (The Leaf Label)

Causing much of a storm at the moment as some journalists frantically modify their best of 2007 lists to accommodate the album, Parades is – all in all – sickeningly sweet. (I am currently blaming this album for the cultivating mucus blocking-up my head.)

The facts: Efterklang (translation, Reverb, according to my flatmate – who actually had to enquire off a fellow Dane.) hail from Copenhagen and they’ve been going at it since 2001. They released an EP earlier this year, which topped the charts in their home country and are now on their second full length LP. There are five members in the band, who are joined by four others on stage.

Reading the beautifully packaged CD case, Parades features more than thirty guest musicians. Just consider it, thirty people who would attend rehearsals, require a briefing about the song they’re featured on, then musical direction / redirection / accommodation. What a monstrous undertaking! Subsequently, the band weren’t able to play any of the songs together prior to the record’s release.

Parades is practically indecipherable. Early listens feel like being dragged blindfolded into Charlotte Church’s home and being bombarded by sustained vocals (namely ‘aaaaaaa’) whilst a gaggle of Welsh girls shriek, “Oooh, lush, I like that, that’s lush that ‘ennet.”

Seriously though, whether the album is meant to be viewed as ambient / experimental / post-rock, or whatever the sound requires some aesthetic wealth. Theoretically, this may be the case, ‘rich textures and intricate sounds,’ but the result is undirected mush. The sound never looks forward nor is it at any point self-sufficient, that’s to say that this listener neither anticipates nor appreciates a moment.

Fuck Buttons – Bright Tomorrow 7″ (ATP recordings)

Thud Thud Thud Thud, Dooooo Do Dooooo Do Do Dooooo, Durrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Opening with a pounding bass drum, which is then over-powered by a dazzling Hammond loop. Then whilst the listener gravitates away into their own world, devastating guitar overdrive soaks up the moment, climaxing with some scream-core gibberish.

This might not be everyone’s favored music, (I wouldn’t hold it against someone if it wasn’t,) but for this strain of sound, Fuck Buttons will please more than most. Potentially more simplistic -hence accessible- than other noise artists, Bright Tomorrow is a sterling tune.