These are heady days for Irish music, in particular for the Sunny South East, where the Richter Collective label has been turning out brilliantly inventive band after brilliantly inventive band for quite some time. A homegrown scene once beset by bland, ten-a-penny singer-songwriters has been transformed in recent years, with outstanding recent releases from the likes of Enemies continuing the trend in 2010. In this climate, Wexford noisemakers Adebisi Shank have cooked up a cross-genre peach of a second album that holds its own against the best of them. It is a record that takes in hardcore, metal, shoegaze and adds a pinch of the 8-bit and chip tune that bassist Vinny explores more fully with The Vinny Club. All the while, it manages to capture the rawness and excitement that has made Adebisi Shank one of the most renowned live bands around. This is music that makes acoustic troubadours look stale and flies the flag for maligned math rock.
The album’s title is telling – Adebisi Shank are a band that favour the elongated approach to doing the simple things. Their music takes the scenic route. Overall, it’s a thrilling ride, powered along with a bubbling, infectious energy. It is about as far from the lowest common denominator as you can go – jam-packed with challenging ideas, and with the musicianship to match them.
Taking Daft Punk’s ‘Robot Rock’ as a jump-off point, The Shank bring a heavy metal mentality to boundary-pushing post rock. Hard, distorted riffage gallops across electronic soundscapes. Half of it is music for headbangers, the other half sounds as if it is being beamed in from some alien planet. Album opener ‘International Dreambeat’ sets out its stall nicely, being a frenetic, complicated wonder that sounds like a rave down by the Vegas slot machines. Elsewhere, ‘Century City’ cribs some Edge-like guitar and ‘Genki Shank’ is a propulsive, robotic highlight. And if ‘Masa’ and ‘Micromachines’ threaten to overcomplicate and overwhelm, relief comes from the likes of ‘Logdrum’ and the choral ‘(-_-)’. Indeed, it is on these less abrasive (and perhaps less characteristic) tracks that the band’s knack for beautiful melodies and ear for sumptuous sounds shine brightest. However, even these mellower moments can occasionally veer towards the widdly widdly. If there is criticism to be levelled, it is that, at times, this is an album that can be too busy, too schizophrenic and in-your-face. Listening through its entirety in the wrong frame of mind, it’s a tad confrontational.
It is, you might say, a record that requires you to surrender to it completely, a record to be played only when you’re fully ready to join AS on their journey of post-rock discovery. Daring, experimental and instantly memorable, Adebisi Shank are the latest fine example of an instrumental Irish band stepping outside of the box. Listen...