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Scam

Blanche Blanche Blanche & The Birds of Paradise

2013

Scam

Release Date:  2013

By Pitchfork

Reviewed January 6, 2013

The Brattleboro, Vt., duo of Sarah Smith and Zach Phillips released several alien-sounding pop records as Blanche Blanche Blanche last year, of them the great and bizarre Wink With Both Eyes via Night People. Now they've got a new 7" single, "Scam" b/w "Press Dumps" (video here), out via Berlin's Adagio 830. The A-side treads further into the esoteric reaches of their surreal language, recorded to four-track cassette with all instruments triple-tracked. It's completely devoid of the skeletal keyboards that comprised much of Wink's foundation, instead pairing an anxious, drowned drum march from Phillips with Smith's monotone mantras. It's guest-guitarist Graham Brooks, though, whose haunted, blown-out solos make the track most peculiar and cinematic-- no doubt emphasized by his closing bit of spoken word, "The best thing about music is all the stuff you can buy."

7:00 PM · Jan 6, 2013 · 3 Views