For a band that's rightly labelled as one of the pioneers of the first wave of shoegaze acts, the new record from The Telescopes is remarkably spacious and expansive. Full of as much emptiness as it contains feedback, Exploding Head Syndrome, out tomorrow on Tapete Records, is a fairly consistent offering from a band that's never really stopped making challenging music.
Stephen Lawrie knows his way around a good drone, as evidenced by this record's superb "You Were Never Here", even as he favors a more rhythmic approach on "Everything Turns Into You", a song full of unease and softly-thunderous percussion. Elsewhere, "Until The End" nearly drifts away into the cosmos, the void beckoning, while the more straightforward "Don't Place Your Happiness In The Hands Of Another" takes a real hook and stretches it to the breaking point. The tune is, like a few here on Exploding Head Syndrome, languid and druggy, but isn't the best music that too?
A record that seems, if not visionary, at least begrudgingly transcendent, Exploding Head Syndrome is a fairly tight release from The Telescopes. One of the quietest records this lot have yet brought forth, this LP is really soothing, even as the faint throb of album closer "Why Do We Do This To Each Other?" suggests a new direction for Lawrie and his muse.
Exploding Head Syndrome is out tomorrow via Tapete Records.
More details on The Telescopes via the band's official Facebook page.
[Photo: Tapete Records]