Mirror Explodes, The

Psych/drone rock. Dark, melancholy, gloomy, subdued. Remarkably pretty... sometimes. “Barren” is the word. Sounds like: the Velvet Underground, My Bloody Valentine. I feel like I keep name-checking Joy Division in these reviews, but... yeah. All tracks are slow. Some are so despairing they’re crushing. Others are just sleepy and grey. There’s a faraway, lost, caged quality to this record -- like you’re hearing it from the wrong end of a well. Very unhappy stuff.

The band: They’re from L.A., they’ve been around for about a decade. Their frontman grew up in a radio station. Well, not literally. Their one-sheet says they have four guitarists and two drummers... why?

try: 4, 5, 2
FCC: 6

1. stripped-down. drony single-note-repeated guitar. bleak, elongated vocals. slow boom-chk drums.
*2. uplifting two-chord guitar. a luller/nodder. soundtrack for a sunrise. fuzzy.
3. shakers & bass drum. builds to electric hum, then cranks up. slow, atmospheric, uneventful. early fade.
*4. this song destroys me every time i listen to it. soft, fragile sun-through-clouds guitar & thin, wispy vocals. slow, simple, beautiful. early fade.
*5. somber, ploddy, eerie. minor descending riff. hangman tambourine & shakers & bass drum. drum kit in midway smarts up the track. cryout vocals: “i’m gonna destroy everything i see”
6. FCC slow. full-bodied sustained guitar and cymbal-heavy kit.
7. (comparably!) faster, (comparably!) noisier. cymbal-heavy. develops a nice groove towards middle, but takes a long time to get there.
8. high-pitched ring intro. shimmery picked acoustic + mellow drum kit. slow, but... optimistic.