What's a Listening Log? Well, the idea is quite simple. It's a weekly segment that consolidates all the mini-reviews Dozens Of Donuts has given on RateYourMusic over the past week, split between the Past and Present. A straightforward grading scale has been put in place, ranging from A+ to F-, with C acting as the baseline average. There is no set amount of reviews per week, just however many I get around to reviewing. And don't expect week-of reviews. I wait one month - with at least three listens under my belt - before I rate and review an album. Enjoy!
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2020 | Neo-Psychedelia | Listen
SWIMMING THROUGH SPACE, SEARCHING FOR HOME
Space Cadet truly is your textbook Bandcamp discovery. The kind of album you find three "recommended" clicks away from what you were initially there for. A bedroom-bred, DIY-brewed mixture of Neo-Psychedelia and Lo-Fi Indie. There's fragile emotion, clangorous introversion, and the mark of an overreaching idealist. To many, Total Kaleidoscope Breakdown will sound familiar. And that's because those niche aesthetics have been planted in the underground Indie scene for quite some time now. At times, Space Cadet recalls early Car Seat Headrest ('Form,' 'Eyes'), while other singular tracks like 'Outerspace' and 'Universe' seem inspired by Glass Beach and Sufjan Stevens respectively, with explosive clarity siphoned out.
Total Kaleidoscope Breakdown features an abundance of interludes disguised as sketchbook ideas, which plays a large part in why Space Cadet's debut feels unfinished and irresolute. Think the primitive days of The Microhpones (Don't Wake Me Up). Those aren't necessarily bad traits, as far as modern aesthetics in Lo-Fi music are concerned, it just hedges the accessibility, especially when some songs like 'Glitter' and 'Dawn' are extended beyond reasonable measures through repetition. If it works it works, as 'Dawn' shows us. But that's not always the case here. Total Kaleidoscope Breakdown also comes with a loose concept of finding one's way home, an interloping evolutionary tale which fits Space Cadet's light usage of Noise and static quite well. It's endearing, to say the least.
C
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2020 | Hypnagogic Pop | Listen
AN ILL-FATED POP STAR WEEPING OVER BUSTED AMPS
I've known about Cindy Lee since 2015's Act Of Tenderness, though I've still yet to listen to that LP. It was that year when the resulting split of Women bore its fruit. Matt Flegel went on to form the successful, and relatively accessible Art Punk band Viet Cong (now Preoccupations), as Patrick Flegel assumed his drag queen alter ego with Cindy Lee. After hearing What's Tonight To Eternity, the trepidations I possessed when confronted by Act Of Tenderness' cryptic Lo-Fi and scathing incorporation of Noise proved genuine. This album is so close to greatness, yet the extended arm reach into the oppressive Lo-Fi aesthetic, offset by the petrified Noise that ruins tracks like 'I Want You To Suffer,' prevent it from achieving that adoration. Truthfully, Cindy Lee probably prefers it that way.
This is a band you'd find at a back-alley club, one with no sign and no formal declaration that its area of commerce even exists. Just imagine Dr. Frank-N-Furter (from Rocky Horror Picture Show) on anti-depressants, cooing of unrequited love in a speakeasy in the Twin Peaks universe. What's Tonight To Eternity is rich in aesthetic, almost to a fault. The slight incorporation of Brill Building whilst confronted by Noise Pop ('The Limit,' 'Heavy Metal') is genius and reminds me, at times, of Tonstartssbandht (especially Now I Am Become). Just with less audacity and brazen charge. I would die for an album that cultivates these two halves, removing the shrouded veil of secrecy that honestly puts the literal concept of shoe-gazing to shame. Cindy Lee most assuredly took inspiration from Les Rallizes Denudes when it comes to obfuscating their talents. There's enough curiosity on What's Tonight To Eternity to prove that statement true, like the Chromatics-esque 'Lucifer Stand' or the guttural drum procession found on 'Speaking From Above.' But it's all crowded by such poor, cheap, boilerplate Noise preventing the true merit from unmasking itself. 'I Want You To Suffer's' second half is a crying shame.
D
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