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(Mind Expansion, 2001)Say what you will about Randall Nieman and his beard, but you can NOT say that he’s failed to collaborate with the creamiest of the croppiest when it comes to spacerock perfection over the years. FUG! This single has the then-semi-retired Telescopes on the A-side lending their vocal hands to a dense, cooing psych-out, and then Sonic Boom contributing synth and voice to a crackling, organ-heavy Suicide cover (“Girl”) on the B. Perfect perfect PERFECT nod-off stuff. More recent Fuxa partnerings with the likes of Dean Wareham have been similarly successful, but nothing else has achieved the streamlined, absolute fuzzhead grace of this single. If down to your last penny, do whatever you can to turn that copper into this slab o’ non-nonsense. And food.
(Earworm, 1999)
“Data Rape (Part 9)” is, you guessed it, a companion to the Data Rape album, and Sonic Boom uses his banks of modified Speak & Spells to create chattering, insectile noises over a machinelike throb. Alienating and distinctly unpleasant; soundtrack to a bad hell-trip. Furthering the scam is the non-audio side B, which is your standard monsters-chasing-each-other Savage Pencil etching… Aw yeh, and KILL YOURSELF NOW if you forget to nab the “special” limited edition, which comes wrapped in a blue outer sleeve. Are you doing it? Are you killing yourself? Wheeeeeeeee!
On that upbeat note, I’ll mention that I’ve been reviewing these crazy 7”s for exactly one year now. So color me thrilled! Thrilled in a blue outer sleeve!
(Earworm, 1998)
Releases by Experimental Audio Research tend to deliver what the group name implies, as Sonic Boom and a rotating cast of friends screw around with various electronics in a non-pop, non-“song” context. Unfortunately, with the exception of some early drone-oriented discs, these recordings come across as far more interesting to create than to listen to, a problem that worsened as the ’90s dragged on. The “Transistor Music” single is all Sonic Boom (credited with E.M.S. Synthi VCS 3 & AKS, Serge Modular Music System, OSCar & Custom Human Voice Synthesizer), who produces layered whooshes, whirs, and voop-voop-voops in a chilly, Doctor Who-esque spacescape that’s admirable for its ambition, but not a whole lotta fun coming through the hi-fi. A much more intriguing failure is the near-contemporaneous Forever Alien album (released as Spectrum), which marries EAR’s electronic fiddling to semi-traditional rock/pop structures for a way-out, uncompromising take-off on what mid-period Kraftwerk only hinted at.
(Chimney Rocks!, 2007)
A pair of Christmas covers from Dean Wareham, Britta Phillips, and Sonic Boom. Meaning: Galaxie 500, Jem, and Spacemen 3 collaborating on a holiday disc?! Yep! And, in a shock to your late-’80s sensibilities, it’s a rootin’-tootin’ family-time success, no joke. These are both some comfortably warm, gather-round-the-hearth marshmallows spiked with enough sleepy psych to avoid all saccharine sap. “He’s Coming Home,” sung by Britta, is a jaunty yet wistful seasonal love song whose reverb-heavy, Wilson-esque production gives it a richness that doesn’t take away from its pleasant breeziness. Future D&B songs should pay mind: a delicate sleepy/interesting balance is successfully struck on this one, and that’s something well worth replicating. I seem to remember “Old Toy Trains” appearing as a limited download several years ago, but it makes its first physical appearance here, and thank whatever for THAT. Wareham croons wonderfully, and Sonic Boom’s familiar sustained keyboard chords crackle throughout. Fantastic! This single is limited to 500, so fuzzhead sentamentalists the world over oughta buy it up now or cry about it on eBay later. Consider that your warning, goof.
(Sonic Cathedral, 2007)
Dean and Britta jump into the 7” game with two versions of a track from Back Numbers, their most recent LP. Wareham has always come across a sober and wry/pointed grown-up in his music – even back to Galaxie 500 – but his post-Luna work, while occasionally pretty, has become suffocatingly adult to me, de-emphasizing guitars and wrapping itself in polite cocktail-party production and Lee-and-Nancy-isms that are smoothed of any edge. Here, Britta handles vocals on the typically gentle “White Horses,” a comatose lounge-popper that gets tweaked for the single with the substitution of French lyrics. No great shakes. On the other side, Sonic Boom hardly reinvents the wheel with his remix, but he does transform the song from an E-Z listening clunker into something quite nicely toasted, an undulating, echo-laden blissout that’d make for swell pool-floating music. Whereas the original begged to be relegated to background muzak, Sonic’s mix – particularly because of the clatter he adds to the percussion – demands the listener’s attention, even while it soothes the ol’ brain.
(Mind Expansion, 2001)
