RECOMMENDED

There is a pile of records here that is taller than it is wide, and within that pile lies very few genuine surprises. When one is found, it is cause to discuss it at length, maybe find a motive behind it. So little music is worth the discussion/deconstruction; we don’t go to town on dissecting Radar Eyes’ chord structures or trying to determine the aesthetic motives of 7” singles released by the same label in groups of three or four. There just isn’t a point; even acknowledging some of this stuff does nothing more than alert the world that it exists. But there must be caution exercised in not over-recommending things that are good, just because so many other things are bad.

So I have no issues telling you about Uranium Orchard’s self-titled debut album. A rock trio with samples, the group features guitarist Jordan Darby and bassist Drew Wardlaw from perplexing punk/HC outfit, Dry-Rot. Uranium Orchard unites some concepts I suspected were at play in that band, sticks a fuse in it and lights it in confidence, blowing the stack of aggression and energy outwards. Riffs form and dissipate around a rhythm section that runs forth, Heisman-style, into a new era of confidence and understanding for gifted musicians playing beneath their stations. Studio recordings snap into live tracks, samples inform us of alternate philosophies (the “underworlds” concept outlined on side B being the most fascinating of them), vocals shift from a Cobain-style croon to phased-out wandering, intriguing in what they say but staying on the right side of the weirdness threshold. This record is plenty weird, mind you, but not in a way that asks the listener to sit through difficult, dry conceptual work, or that would otherwise obscure the great strides they make in the compositional space, as the trio forces through dozens of great ideas that balance one another out and bring you back to the music at hand, stunned and caught unaware of what they did or how it happened. This record is never boring, a rich seam once tapped by California groups like Creedle or Trumans Water, but refined at an intercellular level into something far more valid. If asked I would tell you that I couldn’t remember a record that pushed as many buttons as this one here, nor could I think of such an attempt being as satisfying, coming from completely different signposts than the groups that took a swing at a unified art rock theory before them. I’d also say that nothing ever sounded so dissimilar to MX-80 Sound in practice but touched upon all of that group’s theories and subversive art through rock and noise as completely as does this record. My only qualms is that it starts to run out of steam in the last stretch of songs, but what comes before pushes it across, and will bring you back to the beginning to try and determine where on the path you stopped paying attention to the mechanics of the ride and started being their passenger. And guess what! Only 100 copies exist for the present day. Hand-stickered sleeve with inserts included. An incredible find – thanks Steve Lowenthal for bringing this to my attention. (http://coldvomit.bigcartel.com)
(Doug Mosurock)