Dent, Verstarker (Magnetic) CD
Kicking off with "There must be less to life than this" in which a
miserable brass riff lifted from an old Lee Perry record is repeated
over mute-strummed guitar and slow breakbeats before an organ cuts
into the action and it all repeats in a mesmerising post-rock manner,
Dent have come back to us. Reading the press release, I see that last
time around, I described them (rather flowerily) as eclectic, which
leaves me the problem of what to call them this time? There's an
electronic edge to some of the songs, many are played over loops and
there's some scratching, but it's not techno. There's country
guitar-picking, remnants of folk tunes and a little singer-songwriter
feel, but it's not an acoustic guitar album. There's drone and
reprise, drawn-out chords and film samples, but it's not
kraut-rock. What it is, in fact, is highlighted by two things: one,
some of the band used to be in Camper Van Beethoven; two, they have a
song called "Bangalong" which is exactly that. Basically, Dent do
pretty much what they like, and it sounds great from here. PO Box
460816, San Francisco, CA 94146-0816, USA magnetic@sirius.com
Read the rest of Robots & Electronic Brains
Get your own Free Homepage