Saturday, March 12, 2011

Gary War- Horribles Parade (2009)


Recommended if you like: Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti, Dylan Ettinger, Sun Araw, Wet Hair, Pocahaunted, James Ferraro, Kurt Vile

It's 3:30am and I'm listening to the ridiculously tripped out sounds of Gary War's Horribles Parade. I can't find much on the information on the dude(s), but one website claims that he's a former member of Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti. Not hard to believe, given how ridiculously far-out the stuff on Horribles Parade is. Think Ducktails, Sun Araw, Ariel Pink's early material, the stuff that's nearly drowning it's own reverb-drenched weird psychedelia. Horribles Parade is a strange, unsettling mix of warped vocals, synths, echoing guitars and other generally otherworldly sounds. The more noisy moments recall the creeping cacophony and terror of Pocahaunted, while the album's more straightforward, coherent songs share the strung-out rock of Kurt Vile's early material. And just like The Doldrums, underneath Horribles Parade there is a juicy psychedelic pop core. But whereas Pink's songs seem to reference some weird lost decade in the past, Gary War's music recalls some alien decade yet to come (perhaps the same weird years that sci-fi synth freak Dylan Ettinger is living in). The combination of pop and head-spinning weirdness is what makes Gary War's brand of lo-fi so compelling and exciting. Click the album artwork to sample. You should definitely listen to this stuff in the context of the album, not just single songs.

1. Highspeed Drift
2. Sold Out
3. See Right Thru
4. No Payoff
5. For Cobra
6. Costumes
7. Clean Up
8. What You Are
9. Orange Trails
10. Nothing Moving
11. Anhedonic Man
12. Everynight
13. Next Year
14. Carleen's Yard
15. Scales
16. God Trip
17. Using

Buy Horribles Parade from Sacred Bones

1 comment:

  1. You write so well darling. I tried to listen but I feel like this is another band that you think I would not like, but that I would try to like. lol.

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