Over the course of three years and five albums, this Melbourne seven-piece have slowly persuaded punters at home and abroad to take them seriously, despite that wacky name.
They’re keen to capitalise on the momentum created by 2014’s widely acclaimed I’m In Your Mind Fuzz, and this time they’ve hit on a concept: not philosophical as such, but certainly chronological. Quarters is so named because it’s divided into four tracks – each precisely 10 minutes, 10 seconds – but that strict editing doesn’t make this trip any less intoxicating. The ersatz, jazzy textures of opening track The River don’t initially thrill with their loungey 5⁄4 feel, until you realise it’s just trying to soften up your senses to prepare you for Infinite Rise’s more lysergic climes, full of childlike Syd Barrett-style rhymes: ‘Make some money, eat some honey… tinned spaghetti is good for brekkie’. The sozzled, falsetto-soaked soul of God Is In The Rhythm has a sweet groove, but final track Lonely Steel Sheet Flyer is the pick of the bunch, a gorgeous lo-fi reverie full of sun-dappled shards of guitar and blissed-out, cooing vocals. Not a bad way to spend exactly 40 minutes, 40 seconds of your time.
