If there's any justice, you'll have already heard the utterly genius single from this album, "Suds and Soda". Like Pavement at their maddest and most energetic with a dose of Velvet Underground style discordance, all the time remaining gloriously pop, "Suds and Soda" is a complete head-spin.
And also a little misleading. Elsewhere, only the incredibly beautiful "Via" reaches such heights of pop thrills, the majority of the album being more introspective and moody with nods to Tom Waits, the slower moments of Pavement and the less self-consciously weird moments of the mighty Mercury Rev. The general atmosphere is one of midnight in a dark smoky cafe after too much drink and not enough conversation.
Already I've mentioned Pavement twice, which is probably unfair as dEUS are far from Pavement copyists. Rather they are what Pavement might be if they rejected their insistence on being lo-fi and strived to produce something a little more epic (Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain was a step in that direction). dEUS embelish their sound with violin, cello and organ and are unafraid to use production to add to the atmosphere produced by the songs. Like Pavement, their lyrics often manage to be genuinely affecting, even if you're not 100% sure what they're going on about.
The album gets bogged down a little in the middle with a couple of songs deteriorating into turgid non-entities under non-subtle feedback and song writing, but then "Hotellounge" comes in to save the day with a tune that most of American's lo-fi kings would kill Sebadoh for.
Have I mentioned that they come from Belgium yet ? OK. Well I have now.
Keep an eye on this lot.
- Martin Bate
