I first heard about Psychedelic Horseshit when they signed to Fatcat Records, but they have a lot more history than that, so I can’t claim to be anything like an expert on their music.
All I knew of them prior to this release was the free (and brilliant) Acid Tape they released to celebrate their signing, and this meltdown of an interview with the Washington Post from a good couple of years ago. In that interview, which is worth reading, not least because it’s pretty bloody hilarious, the band effectively have a gigantic tantrum about the concept of lo-fi.
Amongst other things they claim to despise lo-fi and claim that they actually wanted to make a big glossy pop record, and that any perceived lo-fi elements are simply because that was the limit of their equipment and their ability to use that equipment.
I assume that anyone who has actually heard their earlier records (and I only know Shitgaze Anthems and Acid Tape) will join me in saying that that kind of claim smells very deeply of fish. If that is really, truly the best you can do with recording equipment, then unless I am overlooking something, you are a bit of an idiot.
Even I could do better than that the very first time I recorded anything, so I think they were being just a little disingenuous. Just listen to the arrangements and delivery on Acid Tape – no amount of glossy recording in the world was going to make that a pop record anyway. Turning the gain down a bit so you don’t overload everything is what you learn right after someone shows you the On switch.
Anyhow, that interview was just over two years ago now, so I don’t want to go on about it, but it does put this album into context, because whether you think they were talking bollocks or not, the band has been true to their word and recorded a remarkably clean album. Of course, none of the noises they have made are any the less odd for being clean, so Laced is still one of the oddest pop records I’ve heard this year, but it’s a fuck of a lot less abrasive than their earlier stuff.
When I say less abrasive, I don’t mean that it’s not as challenging as usual. The sweet pop melodies in their actual songs emerge just as rarely as ever, remaining otherwise swathed in a kind of ramshackle post-punk cross between psychedelia and experimentalism. They crash along like they have no idea what they’re up to, and tease you with pop every once in a while, but the core of the album is still as unsettling as ever, just with the new production style it feels less explicitly hostile.
This album has a pretty good balance, with songs like French Countryside positively jolly by Psychedelic Horseshit’s standards. The absence of that all-consuming fuzz does make this album a lot jumpier and more erratic, rather than the indefinably malevolent dream which seemed to accompany previous work. I think I prefer white noise to electronic hyperactivity, so when this element is at its most extreme I do find myself less comfortable with the record.
In general I think I still prefer this lot when they assault you with the buzz of angry guitars, and they may punch me for saying this, but I kinda liked the lo-fi stuff. Nevertheless, if you want your pop music to sound like it’s completely plastered and making inappropriately sexual remarks to your mother, then these are the guys for you.
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Psychedelic Horseshit – Laced
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The Braincast is not so called because it unusually filled with penetrative insights, but because if you listen to it this weekend it will be while I am down at the Brainlove Festival either listening to bands, DJing or sneaking off to watch the Champions League final at the nearest pub.
