Deerhunter
Cryptograms
Deerhunter is a pretty killer band. I heard about them through Skyscraper, in a review for their first album, Turn It Up Faggot. Who wouldn’t want to listen to an album called that, especially if it has a bunch of dicks in a collage style for artwork?
So I got really excited when I got this in the mail but then I read the press release and got a little bummed. Plus, Pitchfork loves this band which is usually a humongous turn off to me. But then I went to the group’s myspace page and saw the testimonials posted that people wrote about them it instantly made me want to champion the band.
The album is split up into two separate portions. The first half is kind of ambient drone pieces, sounding a bit like Kevin Shields meets Brian Eno – except for the second track and fourth track – which is heavy psyche bombast recalling Drive Like Jehu with some psychedelic flourishes thrown in, making it sound a bit more DC-ish and maybe a bit like Bluetip. Track eight is when the album changes, morphing into beautiful indie pop with gorgeous melodies and beautiful vocals that compliment the music perfectly.
The songs remind me of Bellavista quite a bit, which is a large compliment. I forecast that their song “Strange Lights” is going to be the big hit off of this album, being adored by everyone who has even the slightest taste in good music. This album has something for everyone and will appeal to the kids who like ambient drone pieces and folks who love songs with great pop hooks – and everyone in between. Deerhunter is going to be fucking humongous.