The first hint of quality is a head mashing display of broken beat screams and wild scratch DJ-ing in the form of dancefloor filler ‘Brian Jones’. With it’s sinister techno/rock backdrop that includes layers of guitar and tambourine, it bores a hole in your head
Solid but sliding ambient digitalisation of ‘Le Renard Artic’ is another highlight, with heavy breathing, distant crashes and waves of analogue noise in the mashed up core.
As is the big-beat 5-chorder ‘Sheffield’, that lurches into view with more than a nod to The Human League and ABC, glitterball disco darkness with threads of retro noise and crooning vocals.
The shadowy cranked-up grind of ‘Wobble’ is powerful too, and has the same melting wax feel, but it’s in up-beat mode where the ICHINCILLA skill is best showcased. The tourist-trappy ‘Ball Of Confusion’, all shades of electro and 80’s pop, is a countdown to disorientated electromagnetic forces
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Breaking from the darkness with a tongue-twisting list of influences that include vaudeville gay disco hi-energy funk and goth metal, the temples widen as the hypnotic groove alters frequency with ease.
“You’re dancing again” declares the record “And you’re having fun”
Part of the record kicks like Frankie with a rocket up the arse, then drops out to a slurring conclusion, burred slow-motion madness that’s amyl-nitrate dizzy. Backward flashes illuminate the irie groove of the self-titled four to the floor headswimmer ‘Ichinchilla’, and the semi-reprisal ‘Dear Brian’ is a disco-dark, whispering, thumping broken pulse classic, the 80’s pop muse looking on from the wings
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