Seven Songs

by 23 Skidoo

Overview

A more descriptive title would have been "Seven Panic Attacks," but even a bland title isn't able to prevent the undeniably savage, pungent impact of Seven Songs, a half-hour long album that plays out like a soundtrack to being bounty hunted in an expansive jungle. Following "Kundalini," a hectoring brain shake that hardly resembles the dormant energy it's named after, "Vegas el Bandito" enters and doesn't imply the James Brown of "Cold Sweat" so much as the panic of night sweats, churning out a taut groove of slap-happy bass, pattering drums, horn trills, and a scratchy-scratch guitar line that chases its tail. An echoing trumpet carries through the end of the song and drifts right on into "Mary's Operation," an anemic drone of even creepier horns and tape loops. "New Testament" is an industrial death lurch of rusted metallic sheets, giving way to "IY," a cluster of conga acrobatics with needling saxophones and frenetic chants thrown on top. "Porno Base," the real knockout, contains little more than a series of abysmal bass pluckings placed just far enough apart to induce chronic paranoia, sounding less like a smut-film score than "Welcome to the Terror Drone." The finale, "Quiet Pillage," despite its exotica reference, could only be played in the ruins of a lounge post-carpet bombing. This is post-punk at its most invigorating and terrifying. [Seven years after being issued on CD through the Turnbull brothers' Ronin label, Seven Songs was reissued once more by LTM. The LTM edition adds the 7" version of "Last Words," "The Gospel Comes to New Guinea," and the entirety of the four-track Tearing Up the Plans 12", almost all of which is crucial.] ~ Andy Kellman

Product Details

Release Date:	11/11/2008
Label:	Ltm
UPC:	5024545527520

Tracks

1. Kundalini
2. Vegas el Bandito
3. Mary's Operation
4. Lock Groove
5. New Testament
6. IY
7. Porno Base
8. Quiet Pillage
9. Last Words
10. The Gospel Comes to New Guinea
11. Tearing Up the Plans, Pt. 1
12. Tearing Up the Plans, Pt. 2
13. Just Like Everybody
14. Gregouka

Album Credits

Performance Credits

23 Skidoo   Primary Artist
Johnny Turnbull   Horn,Tape,Chant,Congas,Guitar,Vocals,Clarinet,Percussion,Tibetan Trumpet,Bass
Fritz Catlin   Bass,Tape,Drums,Violin,Vocals
Sam Mills   Bass,Guitar,Vocals
Tom Heslop   Vocals,Saxophone,Finger Piano
Alex Turnbull   Bass,Chant,Drums,Trumpet,Percussion

Technical Credits

Johnny Turnbull   Tapes
Fritz Catlin   Tapes
23 Skidoo   Composer,Producer
Neville Brody   Design