Space Needle is a band on the edge. The edge of exactly what remains to be determined, but they're somewhere nearby. Hailing from Long Island and buzzing around the New York scene for a couple of years, this decidedly lo-fi duo recorded Voyager on a four-track in a basement, but the album does not reflect those limitations or have any sense of confinement.
Rather, by building layer on layer on layer of guitar strums, synthesized keyboard figures, drum patterns, eerie effects and deadpan vocals, Space Needle creates a '90s take on the spacey, progressive, underground musics that have opened vistas of imagination and sound since the first synthesizers were created.
There's a pop sensibility sometimes at work here, too, and the most accessible tracks would segue nicely with, say Primitive Radio Gods or the Cocteau Twins. The band would likely balk at such comparisons, but they're apt. "Before I Lose My Style," for example, had me swaying with eyes closed, drifting... But of course, in keeping with proper New York attitude, that dreamy track is followed by the abrasive, jarring, epic, in-your-face and out-the-back-of-your-head "Scientific Mapp," an experiment-in-sound recording that could never be described as pop.
I've listened to Voyager at least a dozen times now, trying to get a firm grip on it for your benefit, but have found it elusive in the best possible way. From the first listen, I was fascinated and entranced, and on each successive playing I've discovered something new that draws my focus. If that kind of challenge intrigues you, as it still does me, pick up this album.
