My biggest fear here is having to pick a favorite between these two well-matched split tape partners that Stockholm’s Oma333 paired up for this cassette: both artists strike a post-rock chord with your old friend Strauss, presenting just enough familiar elements in a just-weird-enough way to make me do a double (or triple?!) take. What, you mean I don’t have to choose? Joy. Flip, then more joy. Flip again…. and just guess: Joy. Chicagojazzen, which is music impressively written and recorded by just one person, is what you hear first, and there’s a whole bevy of instruments that flood your ears in stereo, from whining, wailing guitars, to slippery synthesizers, horns, harmonium, some really tasty syncopated drumming (live, and also some glitchy electro-drumming here and there), bass, a voice (or a self-chorus of them), all arranged into smoothly flowing compositions fraught with sections of improvised filler that makes soloing feel more like a harmonic element to accompany the groove, rather than the other way around (which is kind of weird, and of course great). Dammit I’m Mad is what I believe to be a band that fills out the opposite side. This one is both a little rowdier and also a little more chill, with sultry melodies slithering through major and minor 7 chords and a distinct Jaga Jazzist flavor - just a dot of sweet but doused with lip-puckering sour, and all of it done wicked-fast. Scales and rhythms ricochet their way through tricky timing, each track full of measures you wished you’d been counting along with a second ago, but are gone in a flash, quickly followed by a sharp stab of feedback and noise for… what was that anyway, like seven beats? I don’t know. Lost, don’t care. Stomp along, slap me silly and flip it again. Flip. Joy. Flip. Joy. You tired of this yet? Me neither.
More about: Chicagojazzen / Dammit I'm Mad
