Answer: it's all of the above. As human beings, we like this music because it's so unnatural. Psychedelic music allows us to hear things that are otherworldly and foreign. That is why we feel detached and a little bit uneasy when listening to this kind of music; it teleports you into an auditory limbo. Some people can listen to it all day, whereas I can only handle bursts of it. However, I've built up a tolerance in the past few months. Prior to attending Gizzfest in Melbourne, I was listening to progressive and psychedelic rock a whole lot more than usual, and I certainly do not regret it. I've gained more appreciation for the skill and endurance of these musicians - playing a set of this stuff by no means looks easy. My rekindled love for all things psychedelic made the announcement of a new Oh Sees record very welcome.
Mutilator Defeated At Last (let's just call it MDAT) is the 14th studio album from San Fran psychedelic/garage/progressive rock group Thee Oh Sees. I'll be honest by saying that I'm not an expert on all things John Dwyer, I was actually only introduced to this band about a year ago by a friend. The track Toe Cutter - Thumb Buster was the first Oh Sees tune I'd had a proper listen to. Ever since then, they've sort of... just... been a band I knew of and thought were pretty cool - nothing serious in terms of fanatic following. However, this new record gave Thee Oh Sees a spot in my top 25 most played on my iTunes library. Heres why.
MDAT is their most well produced record to date; the low fidelity grit of earlier productions hid imperfections in the instrumentation and songwriting with... well, imperfections in production. This time around, everything is much more audible whilst still maintaining an acceptable level of Oh Sees fuzziness. There are some seriously memorable riffs that manage to tattoo themselves onto the walls of your brain; tracks like Turned Out Light and Withered Hand are prime examples of this aforementioned drilling nature of Dwyer's guitar work.
While the songwriting isn't perfect, gnarly audio effects can suck you into the vacuum of sonic chaos that is MDAT. The introduction to the track Withered Hand has some cool effects that set a great tone to the rest of the track... a whistling white noise that seems to adjust to the pitch of the bass guitar and a constantly panning, broken phone sounding synthesizer that creeps around the ether. Maybe calling this record a vacuum of sonic chaos is a little bit far fetched, however listening to tracks like Lupine Ossuary (which is definitely the most Oh Sees-y sounding track on the record) can make it feel that way at times.
There are certainly moments in which the continuity of this record is broken however. The track Holy Smoke, a 3 minute long instrumental, doesn't really add much thematic value in my opinion. However, it's worth is proven in the instrumentation - it's a nice sounding track, but I just feel that it didn't really sit right in the tracklist. Immediately after comes Rogue Planet, one of the most hectic and punkish sounding tracks on this record - it restores the energy that MDAT was so successfully building. Perhaps Holy Smoke would sit more appropriately as a closer.
This record, whilst not perfect, holds a placing in my favourite LPs of 2015 so far. Mutilator Defeated At Last is a heavy record dressed up in fuzz and clever stylistic choices. Although it's not an everyday listen, it's groove and overall jam-like qualities uphold the gritty garage feel of previous Oh Sees endeavours with a more polished and clean style of production.
Words by Harry.
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