DisAgreement Online

If a thing is worth doing, it is worth overdoing. This is the first line of the opener of Shiny Gnomes’ new album, but probably also the leitmotif of this band which was founded in Nürnberg, Germany in 1985. At first thing started promisingly, career-wise. It was the age of MTV, when it was still a good thing, and indie and alternative rock were starting to become a thing. Shiny Gnomes even released two records on a major label in 1989 and 1990, but major labels being major labels, they probably soon wanted a new plaything, leaving Shiny Gnomes to go back to the independent circuit. More than twenty years later, they are still around, regularly releasing new records, with Otherness being their twelfth longplayer already.

The album title means that the band is sounding different this time, which is quite a feat for musicians having been around for nearly forty years. Locating themselves somewhere between garage rock and psychedelic pop, it’s the latter which is dominating the new album, which at nine songs makes it to a generous fifty minute length. The opener Pearly is a seven-minute psychedelic trip full of mellotron mellowness, hypnotic synth carpets and fuzzy guitar indulgence. This sounds as excellent as Spiritualized on a good day, and is followed by the equally mesmerising Gentle Numbers, another journey into psychedelia, if a little harder kicking this time. The interplaying between wobbling synths and trippy guitars build a fine background for the expressive vocals, and the memorable chorus reminds me somewhat of nineties psychedelia from the United Kingdom. Is It That takes off on a tangent by offering sixties influenced pop with a female backing choir. The occasional distorted guitar gives it a little muscle, but otherwise it’s a quite tame though pleasant piece of music. So much about the first third of the album.

The second third consists of the two psychedelic songs Rococo Carvings II and I which are sandwiching Flashing Clockwise. Rococo Carvings II is at four minutes more concise, and the electric sitar gives it a very Indian feeling. Flashing Clockwise combines a new wave approach with Shiny Gnomes’ idiosyncratic psych sound, topping it with a catchy chorus. Rococo Carvings I reprises the melody of the preceding II, but is at eight and a half minutes twice as long, allowing the musicians to improvise along the melody. The album’s final third feels a little softer, starting with Go On Then whose first half feels rather introspective before the guitars are turned up for the final movement. A second distorted guitar underneath the lead guitar would have given the song more gravitas though. The six minute long The Best Place is another psychedelic pop song with female backing vocals, although one feels like the final two-minute section could have made shorter. The album ends with Head On, a quiet ballad that shows that Shiny Gnomes master a lot of different styles and know how to add them together to make a splendid album.

Most band that long into their career don’t really surprise anymore, but Otherness is truly different. Especially the first two songs are a revelation, but the rest of the material doesn’t stand back that far. Fans of psychedelia that neither mind catchiness nor playfulness should add this album to their shopping list.