Chikinki - 'Lick Your Ticket' (Universal-Island)
4/5
By: Thomas Hannan
From the early hints laid down by Chikinki's prior releases and notoriously sleazy live shows there are two main things you could have expected 'Lick Your Ticket', the band's debut, to deliver. Firstly, somewhere we should find the occasional opportunity to dance. Well, more than occasional - a bunch of inebriated Bristolians obsessed with heavy keyboards and spiky rhythms points to more than a fair share of booty-shaking (especially in the current British indie/disco climate). Two - it should, because of such opportunities, in places be a colourful, buoyant, even joyful affair. This is the bit where, if this were an episode of 'Family Fortunes', the noise for guessing completely incorrectly would sound.
So, our survey says little dancing, little in the way of a good time - it's a record with more of a tendency to be the absolute opposite. Instead of rousing or stimulating (which, to be fair, it does manage to master on some of its best moments - opener 'Assassinator 13' for example), you're much more likely to find 'Lick Your Ticket' in an introspective mood, utilising sparse percussion, acoustic guitars, subtle melodies and a distinct, uneasy sense of paranoia.
Get the feeling you've been cheated? Strangely, you shouldn't, as largely it's still a great album. Current single 'Ether Radio' threatens to burst in to a bass-heavy monstrosity at every turn, but instead lies dormant like an unexploded bomb, and much of the record should be treated with that degree of care. Because it's never kind to the listener and neglects to reveal its overall plan as to where any of the ideas are aiming (even blasting out some gut-wrenching beats would at least let us know where we stood), it can reward a listener's persistence that wouldn't even have been necessary if it laid all its cards on the table from the word go. The sublime 'Drink' is Chikinki at their most individual: an unpredictable, only vaguely coherent collection of acoustic twiddling and a capella interludes, but with a menace they can claim their own.
It continues for the most part in an equally successful manner. 'Scissors, Paper, Stone' is where they hone their formula closest to a summit, not pummelling its audience with speed and hooks, but instead refusing to let go by way of a thumping, slow riff and a drum sound so large it's almost cruel. However, when pace is used, it works so much to their advantage that it becomes increasingly confusing as to why they chose to abandon it for most of the record - 'To Sacrifice A Child' sees Chikinki kicking and screaming admirably, as we'd always predicted they could.
It might mildly annoy a few, but only because it had previously made promises it seems the band had no intention of keeping. And it is true to say that at times it just doesn't work - the sparse, even somewhat tinny in places effort that is 'Staple Nation' doesn't show Chikinki in their best light, 'Like It Or Leave It' putting it to shame later on as its wiser, estimably more developed counterpart. True also is that this is an album deserving of a more worthy finale than 'Forever', but no matter, they got away with it; the old politician's trick of suggesting one thing and doing the other. Clever of them to have us follow this far wasn't it? 'Lick Your Ticket' will make us stick around, though - and that's where the real intelligence lies.
Artists in this article: Chikinki
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