Hymie's Basement - 'Hymie's Basement' (Lex)
4/5
By: Clara Burtenshaw
Lovably, Hymie's Basement are jagged and bittersweet and free from genre; perhaps it is the way diametrically opposing styles are yoked together that makes this such a rarely original listen: beautiful, acoustic guitars overlain with loops and samples redolent of the kind a kid would find whilst raiding the memory-bank on his Casio keyboard.
At times, it even gets a touch 'Kid A'-era Radiohead, but this is more lo-fi, dahling. Song-titles such as 'Suite of the Fearless Tall Dude Killer' (two haunting minutes of roaming piano chords) and 'Pretty Colours (Smile Your Brains Out)' draw similar parallels, reflective and fiercely opinionated emotions finding a musical-outlet amid almost childlike innocence. But it doesn't last long - the more ambient and soothing embers are ferociously contrasted with dirty, rough rapping - cutting and eloquent, and not dissimilar to the style found in confrontation-friendly nu-metallers (see: Linkin Park).
Cohesive we are here, too - the songs follow in a story-like order, each one another tale from Little America, a day in the life of Hymie's Basement, and clever production links each transition seamlessly. The duo's vocals, charming one minute with distinct overtones of Mercury Rev and Pavement, morph into a chromatic cacophony in 'All Them Boys', yet all the noise somehow makes perfect sense.
And even whilst you feel little is likely to change in the music-world via HB's eponymous arrival, there is always space in the vacuous for such musical dissonance, and something virtuous and fluid within the discordance. Follow.
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