The new single by Burque electronic funk ensemble Blitzar is a call to the majestic and mystical bong standing on the totally messed up coffee table sitting in nearly every hipsters living room—hey don’t set that down on my Robert Mapplethorpe special edition completist catalogue of freaky photos, please. The record comes just as spring blossoms everywhere and has a bouncy frolicking syncopation throughout—just like the Easter bunny, yo—perpetually suggesting that party time is any time, but especially when Purps is around. That short melodic phrase, delivered with pep and purpose, becomes a leitmotif for listeners. Every time it bounces out of your speakers, take a toke. I did, and by the time the tune transitioned into a second phase complete with funky, plangent guitars floating alongside, I was ready to dance. But squash the autotune, dudes; it’s the psychic equivalent of a water ring on your favorite picture book.
Peaceful Dissident Nostalgia EP (Self-Released)
This EP makes me have the feels. I got shook up about nature on the first track, “Sunrise Chaser,” a smooth jam that would go perfect with a long drive into the Southlands at dawn, when everything on the horizon is pink and orange for a moment and there is no wind at all except from the wake of the car. The second track, “Culture Shock” also speaks emotively, frozen at first touch, but then becoming accessible as it leads to an embrace that can only be a narrative about the fraility of human interaction. It’s tasty yet has an air of sadness about it. On the final cut, “Childhood Crush,” things get metallic and stressful at the beginning but all that is washed away by a floating melody that practically erases the fear of the unknown, like a small flower blooming in a desert garden.
Cactus Warmuth Attacktus (Self-Released)
A man, his axe and a voice beyond the normative are just waiting to come out of the hidden folds of reality and present themselves to you, dear readers, on this album that evokes Burque and invokes the spirit of Dylan and the methodology of Kendrick Lamar to make the case for indie folk-punk in a stunning collection of 10 tunes. Those songs each demonstrate how powerful simplicity combined with the American vernacular can be when engaged in a pleasantly discordant fashion that eshews pretense and enfolds itself in the nonchalant angst of youth. There’s so much good stuff on this record that you better listen now, before some big record company gets a hold of Cactus Warmuth and changes his delivery for the sake of corporate coherence. Favorite tracks: “Methhead Neighbor,” “Bumming in Albuquerque” and epic closer “Brownie.”
