Live Review from the CPN Files: Fabulous Diamonds

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FABULOUS DIAMONDS @ 208, FRIDAY JAN 29 

On an unlikely street corner was an unlikely house. Sat soberly behind slouching pickets, its façade appeared inauspicious – but it was, after all, only a façade. The domicile was a diamond in the rough, a gem more precious than its exterior disclosed; and perched before it in dwindling daylight this balmy Summer evening was an unlikely abundance of gentlefolk, glowing with muted anticipation – waiting for ignition. The house, a musical manor, sucked us in like slippery strings of spaghetti. Within we were chewed up, mashed into the redolence of a hundred sweaty moonbeams… there, in front of the fireplace, the enigmatic Pex (Predrag Delibasich) stood brandishing his 335. As per his recent custom, the solo Pex performance was a trundling jukebox of lean, loop-based instrumental pop, punk and folk, twangled melodies surfing over rhythmic chugs and stabs. What is perhaps most enthralling about a Pex set is its mystery; without lyrical or visual clues to provide a conceptual compass, one can only guess as to the music’s conveyance; whether it is simply aesthetic, or if its unique style and dynamic carries a theoretical agenda. Pex gives nothing away, and finally dissolves the set into a tremendous pot of thick, custardesque noise and glaring feedback.

      Tyrannosaurus Pex. Click here for more.

After Pex’s climatic fuzzsplosion I needed to chill out somewhat, and in my repose gladly toked on the swirling peace-pipe that was Wigwam. Local drone-king Craig McElhinney and reverb-demon Dave Egan (Carbuncle, Triangles) formed this eerie duo, who rode in on a lonely pulsating wash, eagle wings in desert night-chill air. After some time lounging on the plateau, however, I suddenly noticed a green light overhead and was sucked up like sago in a bubble-tea straw by its mighty traction beam. Commander Egan’s voice had warped to an otherwordly, ring-modulated warble, the deranged croak of a crazed robofrog as it primed me for a probing. Craigos McMartian leered over the control panel mashing buttons and extracting ferocious whumps, whirrs and booms. In the middle of the darkened warp-chamber there sat a glowing earth-globe, an omen of the pair’s fiendish plans. I can’t lie, I was pant-pooingly petrified by the sounds of Wigwam. In a very good way. 

Wigwam's website is located here!

Jettisoned from the mothership I stumbled across the plains for days on end until encountering an unlikely jungle gym climbing into a febrile sky. Ascending its steely tangle, I chanced upon the members of Mental Powers swinging hither and thither, clanging out marble-rattle percussion grooves, blaringly erotic saxophone solos, treacle-organ jets and bowel-bothering basslines. Their paradoxically taught-yet-loose jams ground to a rather somber midpoint; and beguiling though this was, it was a rejuvenating shift to the last couple of tunes, bolting party numbers with infectious and persistent beats. Providing the musical highlight of the evening, Mental Powers’ puzzling brilliance shows no sign of waning; their forthcoming LP, then, should be a tasty little treasure indeed. 

 

Mental Powers at play. Click here for more.

Fresh from the embrace of a subterranean African chasm (or indeed, a plane), Fabulous Diamonds were in town to support those other merchants of keys-drenched gloom, The Horrors. Perhaps it was post-travel fatigue, perhaps the diminished size of the crowd, perhaps the intimate rather than ethereal setting, but the Diamonds were simply nowhere as Fabulous as the last time they graced our coast to deliver a stellar set at the North Perth Chapel space. The ingredients were the same – thick, delayed keys, crisp, angular drum motifs, repetition and monotone vocal chants, but the resulting pie seemed half-cooked, more tedious than hypnotic. The last track, at least, hinted at sublime repetitive immersion, with an intricate, relentless drum line and catchy but incessant Schulzesque synth loop for over ten minutes. The Fab D’s didn’t sow any seeds of doubt as to their general excellence – they seemed merely to be having a dullish night. 

Feast your ears on some rather Fabulous Diamonds.

The unlikely gentlefolk drained out of the house of unlikely tones, trickling down the suburban arteries and into the dark. No passer by would have guessed, as the door swung shut and the lights were extinguished, of the whirlwind of sonic kickassery that had just stormed through this unlikely little gem of a place.