RECOMMENDED RECORD: The Besnard Lakes: Are The Last of the Great Thunderstorm Warnings (Fat Cat/digital outlets)

 |   |  2 min read

RECOMMENDED RECORD: The Besnard Lakes: Are The Last of the Great Thunderstorm Warnings (Fat Cat/digital outlets)

From time to time Elsewhere will single out a recent release we recommend on vinyl, like this one which comes as double vinyl in a gatefold sleeve with a lyric sheet . . .

Every now and again a 21stcentury psychedelic rock band emerges with its roots in the classic late Sixties/early Seventies sound of mind-expanding music with a widescreen delivery.

Elsewhere has long had an affection for Seattle's Sky Cries Mary who emerged in the Nineties and continue to this day, and certain Meat Puppets albums. And when Flaming Lips nail it (as they did with American Head last year, one of our best of the year selections) they are unbeatable.

Into that rare company is Besnard Lakes out of Montreal who have been reaching for the wide spiritual sky for almost 20 years now across five albums full of dreamscape, melodic psyche-rock, some of which have been nominated for Canada's Polaris Music Prize.

So this band around husband and wife team of Jace Lasek and Olga Goreas have some real pedigree and experience, and it all comes together on their first album in five years, the gloriously cineramic The Besnard Lakes Are The Last of the Great Thunderstorm Warnings.

Lasek's falsetto (alongside his wife's gravity-free voice) will appeal to those who fell for American Head, but here with a more grandiose backdrop of synths, discreet elements of everything from dream-pop shoegaze, quivering ballads and epic prog to passages of minimalism, an oceanic wash of electronics (n the closing title track) and songs which build to soaring crescendoes (or can be as poppy as the Cowsills as on Our Heads, Our Hearts on Fire Again), Besnard Lakes ambitiously stake out their own territory.

And possess it.

There is real depth here too: on the aching grandeur of the almost hallucinatory Christmas Can Wait inspired by the death of Lasek's father; The Father of Time Wakes Up which alludes to Prince . . .

Screen_Shot_2021_01_31_at_10.19.35_AMAnd, as with American Head, that tempered sadness adds emotional breadth to this suite of crafted psychedelic prog.

The Besnard Lakes Are The Last of the Great Thunderstorm Warnings comes as a double gatefold vinyl album where the sides are entitled Near Death, Death, After Death and Life.

When that overdue cheque comes in, this vinyl is what it will pay for.

.

You can hear and buy this album at bandcamp here.

.

southboundshoplogo

Limited edition vinyl and CD can be ordered through Southbound Records in Auckland.

.



Share It

Your Comments

post a comment

More from this section   Music at Elsewhere articles index

Various: The Great New Zealand Songbook (Thom/Sony)

Various: The Great New Zealand Songbook (Thom/Sony)

This nattily packaged double disc with Dick Frizzell's clever twist on an iconic and familiar Kiwi image as the cover arrives in time for New Zealand Music Month -- but already has the feel of the... > Read more

Gecko Turner: Guapapasea! (Rhythmethod)

Gecko Turner: Guapapasea! (Rhythmethod)

The absurdly named Gecko Turner is actually a Spanish producer and composer who has fronted bands, won awards, and effected a pleasantly lazy meltdown of global pop and dance styles into something... > Read more

Elsewhere at Elsewhere

WILD IRON; NEW ZEALAND POETRY ADAPTED TO SONG by LORENZO BUHNE

WILD IRON; NEW ZEALAND POETRY ADAPTED TO SONG by LORENZO BUHNE

New Zealand poetry has mostly existed on the margins of available technology. In the days of records, James K. Baxter had some of his poems on the Barney Flanagan EPs, there was a 1974... > Read more

Hound Dog Taylor and the HouseRockers: Hound Dog Taylor and the Houserockers (1971)

Hound Dog Taylor and the HouseRockers: Hound Dog Taylor and the Houserockers (1971)

Although the blues can be a sophisticated music, there's something more earthy, vibrant and appealing about it when it is played from somewhere further south than the cerebral cortext. Hound... > Read more