BEEP – City Of The Future Album Review

The San Francisco trio, BEEP, is equal parts experimental electronica, free jazz, and jam band — a delectable mishmashing, ragbagging, hodgepodging mingle-mangle of sounds. The band’s latest record, City Of The Future, will tickle the sensibilities of easily distracted individuals, while driving fans of the orderly to the brink of insanity.

“Golden Chinese Amulet” kicks off the album, giving listeners just a small sampling of the percussive elements to be found on the disc. What sound like damp sleigh bells and cracking metallic whips are present in just the first half of the track, the other half buried deep in different variations of gongs. Everyday objects make appearances on other tracks; alarm clocks seem to be losing battery life on “Today Is Your Birthday” and toasters seem to be popping out bread on “Labryinth Snacks.” On “Wolf Pantolones,” which invites vocal assistance from the ever-wonderful Merrill Garbus of tUnE-yArDs, BEEP really goes all out, crafting an intense and insane terrain of rhythmic beauty that is quite unpredictable.

Listen to “Wolf Pantolones” – DOWNLOAD MP3

Someone once said to me that the most interesting part about listening to a Deerhoof record is hearing what arrays of sounds the band comes up with, and that is the way I feel about BEEP; I don’t believe I would listen to them with any huge regularity, but the spectrum of musical sound the band explores is impressive, and intriguing.