Ememvoodoopöka – Dort Jak Brus

(CD, Silver Rocket Records)

Oh, how pleasurably these rockers jump into their guitarriffs and easily change between their heavier, trashier side and their more melody-oriented side, without losing that special drug-drenched feeling that I also found so comforting, encompassing and welcome on the early albums by the Flaming Lips. That’s “aw my god” and “telepathic surgery”-era for you and I still love those records. It is not yet the time for all the freaked out, superstudio, multichannel, expensive as fuck stuff, that Wayne Coyne and his folks started as soon as they hit the oil well called Geffen records. With the emems we are still in the era of the basic, raw and straightforward usage of whatever they can get their hands on and then manipulating that. Just listen to the opening lines of “Akela”, to hear what I mean.

Funny, though that the band has no guitarplayer, only drums, bass, keyboards and lyrics in Czech. Because you wouldn’t hear these musical limitations in any kind of way. And maybe I am wrong. Maybe those aren’t at all limitations, but what is giving them the unique kick to go on. The Czech language suits itself beautifully to this kind of rockmusic, which came unexpected to me. But then aagain, my only other record in Czech – apart maybe from some obscure punkrock seven inches I picked up during the time in my teenage hood when I went to almost every show in my local punker squat – is a country-album by Karel Gott, which in its own kind is way on top of the eternal weird list. It sounds like singing against the songs not with them. This problem, of course, doesn’t exist for ememvoodoopöka, because they write and arrange their own songs.

Of these “Syndikat” has made it straight onto my tape I am currently compiling for to listen to while driving between places I live in, though it was in close competition to at least half a dozen other tracks. “dort jak brus” offers a lot of variety, in emotion and atmosphere rather than in style or sound. Most important of all the band never seems offensive or aggressive, but rather enjoyable and like a bunch of good lads; no troublemakers. In a live concert, they have to be great, but only if it is a smaller club with a mixed crowd of beer drinkers, emo kids, old blokes and some teenagers to lighten off the evening. The CD might take away a little of that, but, hey, any band that will opt to play keyboard lines as if they were an electric guitar is okay with me.

For me it was high time for a fine dose of nicely done indie rock, that reminded me of the good times about ten years ago (really that much? Wow) but still was heftily up to date. You see, I even want to be trendy in my nostalgia. Ememvoodoopöka use enough heaviness and distorted vocals (“baros”) to satisfy the noiserocker in me, but are also clever enough to provide resting spaces of less dense and less fast moments. In between that they throw it back and forth, sometimes kicking the hodgepodge to the outer field to strike a surprise goal, at other times coming straight through the middle no matter what. The goal is always to stick one in your mind. Don’t be afraid, it definitely won’t hurt. You might even find yourself starting to dance.