Review Summary: Album #12 for the San Fransisco psychedelic rockers is a bloated and arduous affair. One that doesn't leave much to the imagination...also it might put you to sleep.
It’s getting harder and harder to keep my *** together when concerning you Anton Newcombe. No seriously -- it is getting a bit ridiculous. I don’t care about how much of a drug addled jerk-off you were portrayed as in
Dig! Regardless of how true or un-true the footage was, I’m over it, in fact I never cared. I’d probably still like
Methodrone just the same even if you were(n’t) a douche. What is pissing me off is where you get off thinking quantity somehow over shadows quality. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind the absurd fury with which you used to produce music, in fact I couldn’t ask for much more. But would it hurt to let all these
great ideas of yours gestate just a little bit longer? I mean, dude -- thirteen tracks? Seventy-one minutes? And I’ve got to trudge my way through all this slop to reach the few bright spots? The whole first quarter of the album sounds like a collection of two different cheesy motifs (Bad New Wave Revival & Lo-fi Drone respectively) that you’ve been toying with forever, just turned up to 11,
like it‘s going to fix everything.
“White Music,” which rumbles it’s few stray plucks on some harp strings into Snoozeville, is the clearest offender of this wasted space (time). But the over saturated rockabilly of “Our Time,” is just as easily the pit fall. Could be the infuriatingly lo-fi buzzer “The Heavy Knife” too -- no, it’s that incessant chanting of
let’s go ***ing mental! La la la! on well, “Let’s Go ***ing Mental.” That’s the nail in the coffin, right there.
It’s not that I hate you Anton, or furthermore who ever is in your band at this point -- I just want more. The meandering nature of the music becomes grating by the end. Which is a problem considering most of the better songs are on the back end of
Who Killed Sgt. Pepper? Unfortunately by the time you reach them it’s tough to still care.
It’s sad Anton, considering when you’re on, you’re pretty on. Although album stand out and mid-section crux “This Is The First Of Your Last Warnings” features a minute-plus Dance Punk meets Kraut Rock build up that would make even James Murphy cringe. This is before you let Unnur Andrea Einarsdottir grab a hold of it and transform the song into an inspired psychedelic dance-off. The vibrant electro-pop of “Detka!Detka!Detka!” and infectious “The One,” with all it’s post-punk grandeur, pop up as the few other shreds of hope on the LP. They can’t do much to quell the sneaking (really ***ing apparent) suspicion that this album would have been a lot more successful with a little more time in the oven and maybe a bit more red tape. Anton, I want to like your band, but with
Who Killed Sgt. Pepper? it keeps getting that much more difficult.
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