Wednesday, January 9, 2008  9:20 am 

More epic

We picked up Videohippos‘ new album Unbeast the Leash just before Christmas after a cursory listen in Edgeworld, having being admonished by Colin about their similarities with Dan Deacon, who digs them very much, here we have a hyperkinetic indie with a penchant for the motorik and the super-focused craziness required to deliver it the way we like it, unhinged & taut & danceable & quirky in the same way a razorblade toting chipmink is quirky, tis a very rare species indeed of which Need New Body are but a good example, alas, we don’t know where Philly’s phinest burrow these strange days, life is undoubtedly more boring without them to shake things up.

But we were talking about Videohippos and the flash hitting our brain when we first listened to them while money hand slid sneaky like a snakey into the money place to depart with our hard-earned doubloons in exchange for a resplandescent slice of tye died vinyl they have brought from an undoubtedly magical place, the thought hitting us like a shovel in the face was, woah, these guys have the Boredoms’ relentless stomp sprinkled with Gay vs You deranged trickstery, hold your horses you disbelievers are bound to say upon hearing of such conjugation of sheer goodness, behold ‘Rider’ we respond, we don’t need to hold any horses cos we have unicorns, Tally HO!

Videohippos-Rider

Wise sorceress of the Smell Bianca O’Blivion recommended Narctrax to us some time ago, and upon a listen we grabbed for the parchment containing their spell, they are one of the acts that shall be rocking our world this year with what, if we were going to be lazy, we could describe as Crystal Castles making the soundtrack for a Castlevania video game adaptation of an Argento film.

Journey is the glittering carousel at the end of a derelict funfair, a mad Vincent Price deadringer engineer designed it, a murderous cackling inbred carnie operates it and the ghost of a demon lives inside its power generator, it is painted with oxidised deep red colours and comes perhaps closer, in its over-the-top insane accumulation of baroque thrills, to the spirit of the Goblin/Carpenter originals than the kind of obsessive sonic replication of icy atmospheres which so many go for these days.

Don’t the synth riffs bristle fierce with the epic power of the 80s, reminding you of our beloved Fucking Champs? Hussah! Narctrax’ zombie chews on the guts of its dismembered influences real careless and pisses blood all over Justice’s ham fisted take on the theme from Tenebrae, you can see we are real excited about this tune, but then isn’t it a fucking killer?

Narctrax- Journey

So there you are, in a train out of control, immortal Helena Markos approaching from the front and Michael Myers from behind, all you can do is laugh manically aware that this is an excellent way to go, you will surely be the envy of all those friends that die peaceful & boring deaths while hanging out in the infernal acid filled neon illuminated disco dens of eternity.

labels >> Videohippos, narctrax, xxjfg

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