Free Energy is a good name for Dummy‘s new album, because it provides plenty of it – usually in the form of reverb and fuzz. The band also seems to have had plenty of it while making their sophomore album, as each of the band members is all over the place and playing multiple instruments throughout it.
“Intro-UB” alone features plenty of bubbling, poppy synth beats and bass, and all four members of the band (Alex Ewell, Emma Maatman, Nathan O’Dell, and Joe Trainor) are all listed on the album’s liner notes as playing synths. O’Dell and Trainor’s guitars crash into the room on “Soonish” that almost overwhelm Maatman and O’Dell’s vocals. The Jesus and Mary Chain-like roar they produce is great. “Unshaped Road” weaves and curves, carrying you along on a psych-shoegaze journey to the cosmic “Opaline Bubbletear” with dreamy saxophone by Cole Pulice.
It drifts into the 1990s synthpop-tinged “Blue Dada” and Maatman singing happy, echoing vocals over soft synths and sped-up hip hop beats. “Nullspace” takes early 2000s Garbage and mixes it with industrial guitar riffs and dub synths. Speaking of industrial guitar riffs, the ones in “Minus World” sound like they could’ve been recorded in a metal fabrication plant…and yet the vocals are so upbeat that you figure the workers there must have a great union.
The way Dummy effortlessly goes from the grinding rock of “Minus World” to the trippy psychedelia of “Dip in the Lake” is stunning. The jump back to the heavier, faster “Sudden Flutes” isn’t jarring. It feels right. “Psychic Battery” might just levitate you out of your seat. Nine Clean Nails reminds me a bit of Public Practice with its background ghost-like vocals that somehow brighten up a room. The closer, “Godspin,” feels like waking up in your car at a sea side highway rest stop after a long night of driving and seeing the ocean in the emerging daylight.
Dummy said they wanted to go in a more psychedelic direction with Free Energy, and they succeeded. The shoegaze elements are still there, so don’t worry if that’s what you’re seeking, but this new sound is lovely.
Keep your mind open.
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[Thanks to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR!]
