Bluermutt — Decivilize After Consumption

The musical entity peculiarly named Bluermutt (a word suggested by eBay) creates, like the infamous Perrey & Kingsley, quite catchy pop through 'avant garde' means.

Not that the guy from Barcelona goes as much overboard as that colourful couple. Not in the sense of painstakingly cutting tapes, which has become a lot easier with the arrival of computers and not in the sense of the almost sickening happy-happy-joy-joy coming from that 'in sound from way out'. That said, Bluermutt does make popsongs that are upbeat and uplifting while incorporating a lot of harddisc editing. Pretty much every sound that's recorded on his harddisc has been tampered with. There's a hint of Richard D. James album as well, in its naiveté of the musical themes combined with the playful electronics. He himself says De La Soul inspired him to make music with samplers.

The music on Decivilize After Consumption generally is pretty hectic, full of detail. Even in the calm guitarchords of Fuckin' Jimmy from here all kinds of electronic crackles disturb the peace. It's typical for the somewhat restless nature of the album, but it's also all those soundevents that make the music more fun and exciting. The balance is just right most of the time. Most songs have a strong beat to them to keep it all on the rails.

Decivilize After Consumption is a charming listening adventure. The cd comes in a very nice looking oversized digipak, although of course you can also buy mp3's without fancy packaging.