Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks
Enter the Slasher House
Domino Recording Company

When checking out Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks' single track "Little Fang" last moonth, I was thrilled by a bubbling and entertaining song. Could Avey Tare & co deliver an album full of similarly golden nuggets? Well, let's enter the house to see...

Avey Tare had composed bone-like structures to a big handful of songs on acoustic guitar, before he invited Angel Deradoorian (from Dirty Projectors) to join in to create melodic lines to flesh the bones out. The third of the troika, drummer Jeremy Hyman, bringing his backgrounds in painting and music (being a member of Ponytail) entered the Slasher Flicks' House, and eerie things were ready for being performed and recorded. Under their motto, 'free but structured' the Slasher Flicks threesome produced and recorded what became Enter the Slasher House almost live, using a minimal number overdubs only. The sound result was tagged as 'spooky dynamism'.

Enter the Slasher House for sure is a humoresque project. Their songs are of the whimsical and fanciful kind. 'Free but structured' is indeed a fitting tag. I've earlier name-dropped XTC when describing the music of Animal Collective. And, yes, "Blind Babe" sounds like a rapid, frantic, high-speed XTC song. Opener "A Sender" is a fine introduction to the world of sounds in the world of Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks. It's a captivating song - grabbing you, gripping you, leading you forward through the front door of what probably is the Slasher House. Exciting. "Little Fang" is getting better and better for each listen, being a really cool song with a lazy-dazed dance beat. To quote the label: "...its clean guitars, soft everything and special smoke called "PYT" blown into the tape machine shows off spirits conjured from sweeter worlds." Aiming for a sound being something like semi-monstrous pop, featuring little nightmarish moments spicing up the lyrics as well as the melodies, Enter the Slasher House leaves you more smiling and grinning than in fear and awe, all scared out. This is humour, for sure. Do they succed...? Well, both yes and no. "Catchy (Was Contagious)" works quite well, both melodic as well as entertainment. Other neat dishes on the album are "Modern Days E" and the closing "Your Card". All summed up this sounds a bit like a cartoon record. Meaning; the band is a gang of cartoons or animated puppets. More of the Meet The Feebles styled kind than The Muppets, that is.

Enter the Slasher House is worth a few spins, but my excitement then fades, and I find the whole thing being a bit tiresome. But, scary...? No.

Copyright © 2014 Håvard Oppøyen