Featuring three members of Wildhoney, Dummy continue to crank out alluring indie-pop. The group's newest release, EP2, drops on Friday, and it's more abstract in some ways than their earlier EP this year. That said, the fuzzy charms are plentiful here, even as the inclinations of these players seem to be more experimental this time around.
"Thursday Morning" is woozy, a dream that fades as the dawn breaks, but "Pool Dizzy" is more direct and infectious. Sounding a whole lot like Stereolab circa Peng!, this number is an absolute delight. Elsewhere, "Nuages" follows a similar path, right down to the French title, even while "Mediocre Garden" offers what sounds like something from a European film soundtrack in the mid-Sixties. "Second Contact", however, is far more diffuse and dream-like.
This is outsider music, in a way, but not as abrasive as that tag might lead you to fear. EP2 closes with "Prime Mover Unmoved", a breathy whisper that succeeds thanks to the keyboard plonks that sound like riffs from a mellotron. Instrumentally, we're not too far removed from the backing track of a Clientele side, but the hazy bliss hanging over this makes this, like the other best offerings from Dummy here, a proto-psychedelic gem. Dummy are doing so much more than referencing Stereolab (or Broadcast) this time around, and I appreciated how out there portions of this sounded, even if it made for a more intense listening experience.
EP2 by Dummy is out Friday via the link below. Physical copies forthcoming.
[Photo: Dummy]