The undisputed winner of the ‘best band name ever’ award is of course Sleepytime Gorilla Museum. How do you get it? However, that is not the only achievement from which this wonderful collective derives its fame. The quintet, which operates on the border between genius and madness, resists any attempt at genre interpretation and would therefore fall into the avant-garde corner, partly given the fact that about half of the rich arsenal of instruments is self-made. But Sleepytime is even more avant-garde than that; The epitome of avant-garde that does not want to be an exemplar – cannot be – because of its definition. If we ask the collective itself, it is ‘grindcore funk theater’. How does one arrive at it? In any case, it produces a fixed group of fanatical supporters.
The run-up to this album is also somewhat special. After three albums and successful performances in (among others) Bimhuis and P60, the anachronistic band (explained in the liner notes) hung up its instruments thirteen (!) years ago. As mentioned, it remained quiet for a long time, but after some insignificant activity on the Facebook page, the museum’s curator suddenly came up with a Kickstarter campaign last year. What a joy. They quickly took out their wallet and, in short, you are now reading this review.
Lauded with the above superlatives, the pressure is of course on your shoulders. Expectations are high. But leave that to these surreal sound artists. The pressure was already off with a few singles and I can assure you that all expectations will be fulfilled on the somewhat apocalyptically titled Of The Last Human Being. It is once again full of paradoxical compositions with sonic excesses, subdued introspections and all the like.
That starts right at the kick-off with the totally crazy single Salamander In Two Worlds, in which you are once again treated to a cacophony of extraordinarily exotic sounds. The absurdist track is of course richly interspersed with deceptive lyrics – a mix of the (late) Nietzsche and Clive Barker, with Revian embellishments. You often wonder what drugs caused such crazy madness. How do they come up with it? Well, the tone has been set. Then it goes without saying that the only thing you can expect is the unexpected.
We continue our journey into the World of Musical Paradoxy. Things that could never work on paper are effortlessly amalgamated. This is how the relatively short hoempapa track leads Fanfare For The Last Human Being, from which the album takes its title and in which brass instruments predominate, takes us through fragmented, contested musical landscapes. A colorful group of post-modern jesters and troubadours parade stubbornly and opportunely through a desert landscape, where they somewhat stubbornly break through the oasis of peace – to the surprise and great dismay of its residents. It is a wonderful and crazy spectacle.
In the following, worryingly anarchic El Evil we learn that a nice word is also spoken about the border:
Damas y Caballeros escuchale
La Matemtica Negra de la Carne Idiota o un Conejo Gigantico
O Las Gorillas Durmiendo en un Museum
Where do they get it from? For the real puzzlers: there are two other languages (in addition to English) on this album, good luck! The track itself starts with a driving bassline, which eventually degenerates and culminates in a controlled explosion of meaningful aural violence. Finally, the whole thing is swallowed up by a horror-like acceleration on a Stephen King roller coaster. Miraculously we survive this, but we end up in a kind of endgame with shameless, gruesome horrors: “Nothing this year, nothing from here will outshine the smiling face of Evil”. Just so you know.
If we scroll a little further, we arrive at Silverfish, in which Carla Kihlstedt takes the leading role. Her characteristic delivery as we know it from songs like Angle Of Repose also paints exorbitant vistas and disproportionate narrows here. To illustrate: “A silverfish swims through a sea of frozen words”. How do you come up with that?
This new glimmer is full of boundless follies and copious quips; a sonic potpourri of apparent incongruities. They are all highlights and masterpieces that go in all directions. So it discusses SPQR of course ancient Rome (hint for the puzzlers), but is the TheGift a public indictment of the damned internet: a ‘utopia’ full of addicted cyber-hippies. The thing worth mentioning Old Gray Heron also makes a contribution. This marche funbre avant la lettre is a tribute by Dan Rathbun to his aging father, in which recorders predominate. Just when you thought you had pretty much had it all…
In short, Of The Last Human Being is an appetizingly theatrical cabinet of curiosities of pleasantly misanthropic madness. Art with a capital A, Experiment with a capital E, Avantgarde with a capital A. Hallucinating and hallucinatory… pleasantly disturbed and completely crazy… Insane and ingenious… Pompous, ridiculous, shamanistic… It it’s all. How did they come up with it? God knows… Or Satan… Or Freddy Krueger… Or Kim Jong Un. One thing is certain, we will never get rid of this. So do you like to wallow in exuberant misery? Then you know what to do. Ambugaton!
Track listing:
1. Salamander In Two Worlds
2. Fanfare For The Last Human Being
3. El Evil
4. Bells For Kith And Kin
5. Silverfish
6. SPQR
7. We Must Know More
8.The Gift
9. Hush, Hush
10. Save It!
11. Burn Into Light
12. Old Gray Heron
13. Rose Colored Song
Tags: Sleepytime Gorilla Museum Human
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