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ARTIST
TITLE
B FLAT A
FORMAT
CD
LABEL
CATALOG #
GB 122CD
GB 122CD
GENRE
RELEASE DATE
3/4/2022
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With B FLAT A this much acclaimed quartet from Gdańsk have produced their most epic and visceral statement to date. A universe where echoes of Can, Syd Barrett, and Fugazi lovingly collide. Trupa Trupa consists of "four friends and captains" with different personalities: something that creates, in the words of singer Grzegorz Kwiatkowski, "troubles", which lead to "both a democracy and a polyphonic situation." You could also look to their formidable back catalog and sift through a body of work that can often sound hard, or blunt. Trupa Trupa look to confront evil. The band often does this openly and without compromise; even if the lyrics love to deal in metaphor or intrigue. Inevitably, COVID hangs over everything like a broody rain cloud. Grzegorz Kwiatkowski talks of a "visible paranoia" in the studio during the recording of B FLAT A. According to Kwiatkowski the record -- worked on when an American tour had to be canned at the last minute -- is a "kind of a study of disintegration and decomposition." Though still carrying the weight of unseen or unheard histories, whether ancient or modern, B FLAT A is the release where the provincial math rock, woozy psychedelia, and heavy folk elements finally coalesce in that most unfashionable of things, a sound that can fill a stadium. The band has always been able to shake the roots of any mountain in terms of making a noise but their new record showcases a new, outward-looking sensibility that could moonlight as the kind of sludgy, primetime pop-rock music that Pink Floyd once ensnared half the world's youth with. Listen to the airy "All And All" for example, with its gentle, organ bound melody. It could be a Beatles fly by, or a lost snippet from that period when Rick Wright took over song duties from Syd Barrett in the Floyd. In this regard it seems now that their last two releases, 2019's Of the Sun and 2017's Jolly New Songs (XRAY 136CD/LP) were brilliant teases, "existential" records that played footsie with the listener. B FLAT A is a much more upfront affair, armed with a quiver full of sonic arrows such as potential world hit, "Uniforms". This track, with its Guided By Voices-style simplicity, boils down all the nefarious, quixotic, algorithmic thoughts about "belonging" to a terrifying statement, "I wanna be all my uniforms". B FLAT A also foregrounds one of Trupa Trupa's great strengths, namely, their collective ability to make incredibly tactile, physical music. Nothing is left to chance, there is never the idea that the song and the texts have to undergo an awkward introduction after both have been created.
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