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One shifty drumbeat spans the first side of Excepter's latest, and a similar beat the flip. Their speed peaks induce light nausea, their slowdowns descents into hazy apathy. For example. The sum of Vacation/"Forget Me", even stranger than such parts, is 22 minutes of amorphous and affecting grit. (Playing this at a seance could make a legendary senior prank.)
In a recent Dusted feature, Justin Farrar tackled Excepter's debut LP with elixirs and letters, and it's tempting to follow his lead. The unprovoked mind may be too weak a tool for dissecting this creature.
But, bearing with Aristotle for now, Excepter have a place and a style that can be told. As NNCK and Jackie-O Motherfucker and scores of psych from throughout history have proved, she is rewarded who explores the unexplored. When a new instrument/idea comes along, fuck with it on drugs - an unfuckwithable formula. Excepter's instruments, presumably modified to sound as fresh as they do, include "boxes," and "progs." Much of the mix also goes through an echo filter, rendering it syrupy and bottomless. That sound is unmistakably the American Psych Scene of the Present; that logic is tried and true and in tip-top form.
The vocals (and here's where the seance idea shines) are a man wailing brokenly and a woman wailing sweetly, both nearly overwhelmed by the mix. Both voices are devoid of language, too, which would be terrifying by candlelight with the medium none-the-wiser. It's eerie enough at 11 a.m.
Not to overstress the funereal: of the zillions of noises on Vacation/"Forget Me", not a few are angelic. Piano and synth-notes twinkle down modular steps of a scale, borrowing brazenly from the NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) sports library. Baseball Stars here, Ice Hockey there. Elementary electro-pulses saccharine in the brine. And climaxes aplenty. Far from a parabolic Godspeed construct, Excepter execute at random - what better tactic - their fits and starts. Which is lively and colorful and distances them from lumbering instrumental rock epics.
Short and severe, in conclusion. A right offering from a band playing around Brooklyn often, with a jones for the supernatural and the altered. Carlos G., if you're reading this, please make a note for No Fun Fest '05. By Ben Tausig
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Throne