CD Reviews

Micachu & the Shapes | Jewellery

Rough Trade (2009)

By ZETH LUNDY | March 23, 2009

3.0 Stars

The brief and ebullient debut by 21-year old Mica Levy et al. is so tic-ridden and childlike, and so packed with dissonant non-chords and chirping calls of hand-clapped rhythm, you'd think a pack of kids had picked out the instruments and written the arrangements. In fact, Jewellery's regressive auditory freakout is part of its greater complexity.

Listen closely and you'll hear pastoral English twee, Carl Stalling cartoon music, bull-headed hardcore, early rock and roll, and nicks of contemporaries like Animal Collective and Hot Chip. And that's just the first track. The rest of the songs, produced by microhouse man Matthew Herbert, eagerly follow suit, like Pop Rocks in a stomach full of Coca-Cola, or caroming candy-coated pinballs.

Levy's unorthodox and, in some cases, homemade instruments strum and stutter with calculated abandon; her heavy British accent slumps itself across this glitchy bubblegum arcade and blunts it, as she sings of everything from premature scavengers and math problems to matters of the heart that need not be so intelligible.

Topics: CD Reviews , Animal Collective, Animal Collective, Hot Chip, More

| More

Friends' Activity

Popular

Most Viewed

See more deals

view all

[ 02/12 ] 69˚S [The Shackleton Project] @ Paramount Theatre

[ 02/12 ] Boston Lyric Opera conducted by David Angus @ John F. Kennedy Library and Museum

[ 02/12 ] Stephen Petronio Company @ Institute of Contemporary Art

ARTICLES BY ZETH LUNDY

THE PUNCH BROTHERS | WHO'S FEELING YOUNG NOW? | February 07, 2012
For a group full of virtuosos, the Punch Brothers refuse to dole out prodigious string-murdering sessions.

AIR | LE VOYAGE DANS LA LUNE | January 31, 2012
It was inevitable that Air would one day be asked to soundtrack a colorized version of an iconic 1902 silent French film about moon exploration, right? There's the French thing, the moon thing, the kitsch-cool factor.

FUTURE OF THE LEFT | POLYMERS ARE FOREVER | January 17, 2012
Since we last heard from Future of the Left, Cardiff's greatest non-furry export lost founding member Kelson Mathias and gained two new ones.

ALEX CHILTON | FREE AGAIN: THE ''1970'' SESSIONS | January 10, 2012
Post–Box Tops and pre-Big Star, Alex Chilton was an 18-year-old Memphis boy on his way to his dual identity: former #1 pop hitmaker, perpetual underground hero.

SMASHING PUMPKINS | GISH/SIAMESE DREAM | November 29, 2011
Billy Corgan's zeitgeist whine, so omnipresent via high-charting Siamese Dream tracks "Today" and "Disarm," was the true sound of the alterna-'90s.

See all articles by: ZETH LUNDY

Most Viewed

Most Emailed

CAN THE CHARLES RIVER ESPLANADE BE TRANSFORMED INTO THE WORLD'S BEST PARK?
What if — in place of the current three-story Museum of Science parking garage overlooking the Charles River — there loomed a giant Ferris wheel, on the order of the London Eye?

VAN HALEN | A DIFFERENT KIND OF TRUTH
Who would've thought Eddie Van Halen would still be innovative in his late 50s?

AN INTIMATE GUIDE TO DINING IN — AND EATING OUT — THIS VALENTINE'S DAY
Food and sex have long been intimate bedfellows. What's the endgame of a dinner date but the prospect of the coital desserts waiting at home?

REVIEW: 69°S.: THE SHACKLETON PROJECT
“Men wanted for hazardous journey, small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful, honor and recognition in case of success.”

THE BIG HURT: THE MIRACLE OF JAPANESE WIKIPEDIA
In a break from my usual bad-jokes format, I bring you something so strange and wonderful that I just had to share it with the world.