Deeper, “Fame” (Sub Pop)
Deeper represent one of Sub Pop’s most interesting rock-band signings of the 21st century, up there with Heron Oblivion, GOAT, and Morgan Delt—all of whom didn’t sell that well, but that’s the public’s fault. Chicago’s Deeper are near the beginning of what appears to be a promising career in galvanizing, melodic rock—of which America is not exactly generating a surplus.
The follow-up to their solid sophomore LP, Auto-Pain (released in March 2020 and promptly memory-holed by the pandemic), Careful! is not so indebted to ’80s-era Cure as its predecessor. LP opener “Build a Bridge” pushes singer Nic Gohl and Drew McBride’s compelling guitar tones to the fore. The way their riffs jut out at unusual angles hints of Pavement and Wire at their respective peaks. The stark, taut art rock of “Glare” sounds as if it’s embellished with Mellotron, but once again Gohl and McBride’s contrapuntal interplay pricks up one’s ears, as does Gohl’s vocals, which exude the poised panic of David Byrne circa Talking Heads’ “Cities.” “Sub”’s poised, angular rock splits the difference between early-’80s XTC and Gang of Four.
Slight deviations include “Tele,” a romantic new-wave throwback, but with brawny post-punk bass adding much-needed ballast; “Bite”’s motorik rock that swiftly rolls over the countryside and gains anthemic momentum as it goes; “devil-loc” proves that Deeper could excel at synth wave, if they so desired. All of “Airplane Air” exists in one tension-inducing mode, each beat accented with what sounds like an off-key trumpet blat. It shouldn’t work, but it does. Much credit must go to Deeper’s makers of spine-tingling riffs, Gohl and McBride.
With its staunch bass pulsations, distinctive clap-augmented beats, ascending, double-helixed guitar counterpoint, “Fame” (which is not a David Bowie cover) makes you feel as if you’re marching to a doomed confrontation—shades of Seattle’s legendary A Frames. Gohl’s singing bears the shredded-nerve tenor of Robert Smith’s, but thankfully is not as cloying as the Cure’s frontman’s.
Unlike many modern rock groups, Deeper—who include bassist Kevin Fairbairn and drummer Shiraz Bhatti—understand the importance of groove, no matter how complicated the two-guitar pyrotechnics get. Despite having a few tunes of steady-state adequateness, Careful! proves that the farther Deeper diverge from trad indie rock, the better they sound.
Lagoss, “Los Aquachachos” (Discrepant)
The three-piece Lagoss operate out of Tenerife on one of Spain’s Canary Islands, and damn, is their music strange—not the sort of thing you’d expect from a place that looks like paradise. If American exotica artists such as Martin Denny and Les Baxter repurposed musical elements from tropical wonderlands of the South Pacific and East Asia into palatable morsels for Western listeners, Lagoss (Gonçalo F. Cardoso, Mladen Kurajica, and Daniel García) are straight up inventing a phantasmal strain of avant-exotica that baffles the mind as to where it originates.
On 2020’s Imaginary Island Music Vol. 1: Canary Islands, Lagoss’ output is like library music for other planets, soundtracks for unfathomable scenarios. The newest full-length, Imaginary Island Music Vol. 2: Ascension, annihilates the widespread notion that originality in music is impossible. Sure, I could posit some glib comparisons like “the Residents remixing Jon Hassell‘s Fourth World Music” or “Haruomi Hosono’s Cochin Moon transported to Saturn,” but even those don’t come close to capturing the sheer amplitude of oddity Lagoss create.
It makes sense that former Portland sound sorcerer Spencer Clark guests on “Rumba Lactea,” whose oblong beats trundle through bizarre aural flora and fauna; every timbre is artfully distorted and getting your bearings is a fool’s errand. “Baja pa bajo” comes across as an altered-state marimba meditation with a wind instrument of unknown provenance. The song has the oneiric charm and disorientation of UK exotica experimentalists Pram.
On “Los Aquachachos,” the rhythm sounds vaguely Latin, but it quickly shifts into a quasi-technoid thump with mad hand percussion, melting-tone organ, scintillating sci-fi bleeps, and sad-robot crooning. The track’s structure is as illogical as your weirdest dreams. Lagoss’ members have gone the extra kilometer to forge the strangest sounds they could from their instruments, in order to make them evoke unprecedented feelings. This is rarer than good news about Earth’s climate.
Lagoss perform August 26 at Gallery 1412 with Starving Weirdoes and a screening of Robert Millis’s film, This World Is Unreal Like a Snake in a Rope.
