Not long ago, Texas was just a barren desertland reserved for TV fantasies of glamorous oil magnates equipped with ten-gallon 'skypieces' and oversized rose-tinted shades, a place where grandparents could still find a Butch Cassidy-style bar brawl and desert creatures fought over passing Dodge Rams for the sweet mercy of an air-conditioned afterlife. Can you still feel the ghostly wind of J.R. Ewing blow through the very fabric of your being in downtown Dallas? Wouldn't be Texas without it! You can even sense his spirit mingling with the stink of sun-dried horseshit on the open prairie, if you're bored enough. Ahh, but after all these years of proudly sustaining its stereotypes, Old Lone Star's finally ready to contribute something worthy of the endless expanse it so greedily hogs.
The past couple years have seen countless unknowns barreling out of Texas' scorched earth, like the bloodthirsty groundworms lunging for Bacon gristle in Tremors: Lift to Experience brought religious fanaticism to Spiritualized guitars; Stars of the Lid breathed hypercolor cinematography into stagnating ambient drones; and our boys in the Trail of Dead built a monument to indie's darkest string-shredders, delivering such visceral elysium it earned them their very own caravan of Deadheads. Folks haven't seen that kind of loyalty in those parts since Pee-Wee gumshoed for his hijacked Schwinn at the Alamo.
But it gets better with Secret Machines' freshly issued debut, which at last pushes America's waning psych-pop movement beyond the four-tracked Beatles bounce of the Elephant 6 crew. The trio draws from the same pool of influences that informs the Flaming Lips' recent work, and shares Wayne Coyne's talent for rapturous melodies. But where the mighty Lips rarely veer from psych-pop traditionalism, Secret Machines spend as much quality time with extended instrumental passages as they do with instantaneous pop hooks.
Secret Machines aren't completely innocent of the jam-band aesthetic that's colored so much of psychedelia's fluorescent history; they build repeating patterns and layer effects in crescendos taller than Chase Tower. Fortunately, these moments never come off like academic experiments in drum-circle theory or languid, aimless noodling. The band prefers a more engaging and concise approach to their epic sound collages-- these beasts never run past the four-minute mark, and all of them burst into glorious pop songs sooner or later. There's not even an ambling tabla/oud/sitar setup to contend with-- just the creative deployment of comfortably conventional instrumentation and textured sci-fidelity backdrops. But let's get hypothetical and imagine that these kind of build-ups aren't your cup of Godspeed. Hey, great! Those only comprise about a fifth of the disc's 28-minute runtime; the rest is a triumph of classic indie rock tradition: tuneful immediacy, thundering choruses, and forward-thinking ingenuity.
Recorded at Chicago's Clava Studios with producer Brian Deck, Califone guitarist Tim Rutili, and drummer Ben Massarella, September 000 sparkles with the intensity of the rhinestone bling the Secret Machines' Dallas hometown built its oil-playboy rep on. Some of Deck's recent work is marred by digital over-processing, but the subtle effects that underscore this record achieve a largely organic space-rock sound. Chiming keyboard tones communicate with the inventive creaks and whispers uttered by Ben Curtis' treated guitar, adding an abyssal depth to the hummable pop gratification that gives the disc its magnetic pull.
Two songs titled "Marconi's Radio" bookend the record. The opener builds from a sparse, repeating keyboard figure into a squalling burst of dense noise before U-turning into a beautifully arranged ballad where Josh Garza's taut, snapping drumkit collides with Brandon Curtis' plaintive vocals. The second version is a shorter, upbeat instrumental variation with chaotic junkyard percussion and intricate multilayers of ear-candy adornment. As sounds are piled on, the track quickly builds to a frenzied upset, and the rhythmic handclaps that punctuate its spirited melody erupt into enthusiastic applause. "What Used to Be French" is more immediate, with its pulsing bassline, wailing guitars and explosive chorus, but the three-minute burner "Breathe" comes away the clear winner-- a raucous, energetic pop basher that contends with (and to a large degree, sounds like) the best moments of the New Pornographers' Mass Romantic.
The Secret Machines recently relocated to New York City, presumably because they were tired of people referencing the Ewing dynasty in their reviews. But they're proud of their Texan heritage, and they should be. Life is finally emerging from its cracked soil, and I'm taking this disc as a sign that this new scene's prepared to produce enough great music to finally scrub the Fabulous Thunderbirds' greasy prints off the pop culture cerebellum. Grab those brushes, men, "Tuff Enuff" ain't coming off without a fight.
