There's been such an embarrassment of riches coming from the lo-fi garage rock/psych duo of Mike Donovan and Matthew Hartman that I can barely bring myself to finish reviews on time. It's that overwhelming. Though it's almost a cosmic convergence that Sic Alps have landed on the Siltbreeze label for their latest LP, U.S. EZ, they stand a step or two apart from their more hotly-tipped peers, as they recall bands from much further back (past the early 1990s, even!). Their primitive riffery belies hours of mining for dusty psychedelic nuggets while their simple and strange recording style calls back to the earliest rock'n'roll, as does the direct, innocent spirit found in many of these songs.
Still, this is new territory for the band. Sludgy and spare as they may be, Sic Alps do know how to write pop songs, and U.S. EZ is, surprisingly, almost nothing but. But their pop songs, despite their simplicity, still keep you off balance and snap you out of passive listening, as with the false ending in "Massive Place" or the bit of xylophone in the closer "Quai Des Orfevres". Some deconstructive impulses remain, like the few choice blasts of static clamoring for space in the languid instrumental "Bric Jaz", but these harsher moments are smuggled more inconspicuously into the songs.
The approachability found here, when mixed with the scruffy recording ethic, makes the songs feel instantly familiar, yet still somehow alien. "Sing Song Waitress" is a sweet and longing tune that's nonetheless thrown askew by high-register backing vocals that warble like the sound of children crying through neighboring floorboards. A similar backing is found elsewhere in the two-chord stomp of "Mater", which ends with abrupt self-narration from singer/guitarist Mike Donovan. Even the fruity, Beatles-like shuffle of "Gelly Roll Gum Drop" sounds just a little left of center somehow.
Without a doubt, U.S. EZ is a far more structured and melodic record, though its few more experimental tracks-- "Put the Puss to Bed" or the unexpected pummel and howl of "N##JJ"-- pale in comparison to the ones that made A Long Way Around to a Shortcut so wonderfully unpredictable. Granted, that was a singles collection, so of course it's more diverse. But here, amidst the nods to a noisier past and the occasional dip into intoxicated broken blues ("Clubbing for $$", "CO/CA"), U.S. EZ breaks through with tracks like "Everywhere, There", which takes woozy primitive pop and transforms it into something simultaneously fragile and coarse and then, suddenly, sublime.
