Album Review: Xiu Xiu - '13" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips'
The experimental trio reach their highest levels of innovative chaos, with a record unlike any other this year.
Originating from Los Angeles, California, Xiu Xiu has become one of the most highly acclaimed groups for fans of post-punk and synth-pop who like the more shocking side of the genres, with influences from modern Western classical, noise and experimental music, Asian percussion music, American folk, torch singers, house and techno.
Recently moving to Berlin, Germany, Multi-instrumentalists Jamie Stewart and Angela Seo are the creative core of the band, with the ex-Devo and Sparks drummer David Kendrick joining as their percussionist ahead of their last record Ignore Grief.
13” Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips was mixed by Grammy award-winning producer John Congleton, who has previously worked with the likes of David Byrne, Modest Mouse and Swans, Congleton was given a band-directed dictum that he should feel free to both “go crazy” on this record.
And crazy he went, with a sound so particular, distinct and far from normality in the best of ways.
The opening track “Arp Omni” ushers in waves of crushing string sounds, along with Stewart’s familiar eerie lyricsm, as he laments his mistakes since becoming an adult in one of the trio’s most powerful compositions to date.
“Maestro One Chord” instantly hits like a brick wall, with a distorted drum sound punching through the zestful electronic bass, as the wide sounding calls of Stewart “floating in space” are followed by rugged rhythms of various unearthly sources coming to the forefront.
“Common Loon” is one of the strongest three minutes in an album which seems to be lacking a single second of weakness, as the aforementioned drum sound is now accompanied by a spur of lively guitars which lead us into a chorus of gargantuan proportions, a sound which feels as large as any of Congleton’s past achievements.
Tracks such as “Pale Flower”, “Bobby Bland” and “Piña, Coconut and Cherry” put on display the trio’s knack for supernatural electronic music, all tasteful reminders of their fluidity in genre and their creative abilities in making a soundscape so unique and abnormal, yet cosy and familiar.
“T.D.F.T.W” is another highlight, with the heavy instrumentation coming together into one fiery wall of sound, with some eerie vocal work from Stewart and Seo with the resounding calls of “The devil forgiven, that’s why” repeating throughout the scorching ending.
Out on 27th of September through Polyvinyl Records, this is one not to miss for fans of the abnormal.
Words by Jay Cohen
