White Fence

Cyclops Reap

Written by: BV on 01/08/2013 14:21:55

Oh White Fence, how I have waited for a new release with a mixture of childlike anxiousness and a dreadful fear of what’s to come that can only truly come from a slightly cynical reviewer that is fully aware that a name alone is never a stamp of approval. For those of you not in the know, White Fence is the moniker behind which a man named Tim Presley resides. Perhaps most notable to some for the collaboration with super-hyped garage-rocker Ty Segall, White Fence is perhaps the more freely floating and psychedelic variant of the garage spectrum, in which the music really doesn’t revolve around fuzzy tones, rather than odd ambience and quirky melodies flavored with tambourines and the occasional use of a crunchy riff or two. With this new album titled “Cyclops Reap”, White Fence tries to live up to the creative standards of “Is Growing Faith” and the Ty Segall collaboration “Hair”. – And actually manages that to some extent. Read on to find out how and why;

With album opener “Chair in the Dark”, the psychedelic quirkiness is almost instantly turned up to a maximum with the introduction of a rubber-sounding bass, chiming garage-ish guitar parts and a vocal line that, if anything, resembles a slightly hung over whisper as opposed to a genuinely sung performance. This however, is just the thing to look for when listening to White Fence as it serves as a genuine counter-act to a far too streamlined creative process of many other artists – major label or not.

Proceeding to “Trouble Is Trouble Never Seen”, the soundscape evolves into something quite harsher as the guitars are no longer chiming – rather they are gritty and overdriven. The general soundscape is lo-fi in that charming way that only garage acts seem interested in pulling off, as the drums sound like they’ve only really been recorded with an overhead microphone. In terms of general songwriting though, this album generally does not seem as interesting as the Ty Segall collaboration. The reason for this might be the fact that the collaboration had an edge to it, whereas this album is more of quirky piece of experimentation in itself – its genuinely quirky for the sake of being quirky, it would seem.

The acoustically ringing “Run By The Same”, which is some sort of psychedelia infused country piece, seems to fare far better than the remainder of the album, in spite of its equal dosage of unusual sounds. The reason for this might very well be the highly audible vocals throughout the simplistic soundscape, as well as the playful dynamic that seems to dominate the track. Whilst this album still sounds like the hallucinations of a person right on the edge of insanity, it does still have its moments of glory – though it never really amasses to become anything more than slightly interesting.

6

Download: Run By The Same, Chair in the Dark
For The Fans Of: Ty Segall, Syd Barrett, Jeffrey Novak
Listen: facebook.com

Release Date 09.04.2013
Castle Face Records


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