I grew up listening to indie music and now if I were to listen to, say, the guitar part of an indie song I could probably fill in the kind of bass and synth that would be accompanying it, and the same applies to just hearing the synth part etc.
African guitar pop, however, is a different kettle of fish. I am almost always smitten by the conflagrations of rhythm and at how each instrument tries to break away from the others, and yet works alongside them to create beautiful textures of staccato chimes. It’s always as sublimely bemusing as reciprocated love.
And so, although the new Mice Parade album looks, feels and smells like an indie record, I am still happily taken aback at the first track, ‘Kupanda’, a gentle slice of West African Highlife that combines cascading guitar and kora notes with the effortlessly sensual voice of guest vocalist Somi.
From this point on the album trips lightly around a variety of styles – whilst still retaining an overall left-field sound. This mix is centred round the Mice Parade main man Adam Pierce who has seemingly scoured the globe to pick his collaborators for this project. And while the West African feel emerges again on tracks like In Between Times, a more indie feel is present on tracks such as ‘Mallo’ where a fuzzy, driving simplicity of sound and rhythm make for an upbeat grunge-lite track. The two worlds even combine time and again on some fine-boned alt-rock such as the track ‘Recovery ‘ which contains both flat-footed distorted guitar and an insolence of rhythms that poke and tease the listener. Elsewhere, ‘Even’ sounds a bit like the Shins, ‘Couches and Carpets’ like the Postal Service unplugged and ‘Tokyo Late Night’ like a film soundtrack with its three minutes if jazzy atmospherics.
Overall then, this sounds like an album made with its mad captain at the helm and the A&R department locked in the hold. It is uneven and non-commercial and happily so. And ‘Kupanda’ alone is worth stowing away for.