New Electric Ride – Balloon Age (2014) review
New Electric Ride “Balloon Age” (Beyond Beyond is Beyond Records, 2014)
Debut
album by this act is made of whimsical psychedelia with a distinctly British
flair. What I like most are the
inventive twists and turns. While the
whole album has a consistent tone in sounding like tripped-out Swinging London
circa ‘67/8, you still never quite know what’s coming next. There’s some
crunching guitar work that nicely offsets the toytown vocal melodies. There’s
instrumental sections where I swear they’re going to break into Captain
Beefheart’s “Ella Guru.” If I’d heard “Bring What You Expect to Get” without
knowing who it was by, I would just assume it was an XTC/Dukes of Stratoshphear
track I had somehow never heard before. They make me think of The Idle Race,
Tomorrow, The Move, also contemporary XTC soundalikes Pugwash. I have my back
up these days with current bands who too slavishly attempt to mimic 60s psych,
and while I can’t say New Electric Ride are free of this (I’m sure they don’t
intend to be), their inventiveness keeps me guessing and their tunefulness
keeps me listening.
album by this act is made of whimsical psychedelia with a distinctly British
flair. What I like most are the
inventive twists and turns. While the
whole album has a consistent tone in sounding like tripped-out Swinging London
circa ‘67/8, you still never quite know what’s coming next. There’s some
crunching guitar work that nicely offsets the toytown vocal melodies. There’s
instrumental sections where I swear they’re going to break into Captain
Beefheart’s “Ella Guru.” If I’d heard “Bring What You Expect to Get” without
knowing who it was by, I would just assume it was an XTC/Dukes of Stratoshphear
track I had somehow never heard before. They make me think of The Idle Race,
Tomorrow, The Move, also contemporary XTC soundalikes Pugwash. I have my back
up these days with current bands who too slavishly attempt to mimic 60s psych,
and while I can’t say New Electric Ride are free of this (I’m sure they don’t
intend to be), their inventiveness keeps me guessing and their tunefulness
keeps me listening.
Review made by Brian Greene/2014
© Copyright http://psychedelicbaby.blogspot.com/2014
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