LA’s young purveyors of ‘60s psychedelic pop Foxygen return with an eclectic array of genre and artist referencing, follow last year’s Take the Kids Off Broadway.
It’s packed with familiar psychedelic tropes, airy backing vocals, rhythm shifts, warbling synths, reverb drenched guitars and weed references.
What separates Jonathan Rado and Sam France from other psychedelic musicians is their over-arching playfulness.
There’s the charming hint of gospel on ‘On Blue Mountain’, or the delightfully over-the-top twee chorus of ‘San Francisco’.
Similarly, lyrics shift from biblical references, to rhinoceros earrings, to bagging out people from Brooklyn.
With the amount of creativity on display, the struggle with the album would have been trying to piece it into a concise whole, and for the most part, the band succeeds.
Album opener ‘In The Darkness’ isn’t inspiring; but lead single ‘Shuggie’ carries itself which such a subdued swagger, announcing itself as one of the catchiest tracks of ’13.
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While Kevin Parker may channel all his psychedelic forebears through a synthetic array of kaleidoscopic colours, Foxygen keep their production grounded in the real, familiar world.
The sounds, even when combined with lawnmowers and industrial machinery, as on ‘Bowling Trophies’, always sound warm and authentic.
They are also happy to tow a fine line between wearing their influences on their sleeve and directly mimicking them.
France’s vocals recalls both Suicide’s Alan Vega and Mick Jagger in the same verse on the album’s titular track, while the record finishes with a ratbag rat-pack homage verse on the piano.
Elsewhere there are clear Kinks and Beatles touches, but Foxygen never sound like they’ll have to ship their royalties to someone else.
We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic is a wildly creative romp through the Californian pop landscape. The band are cocky enough try their hand at most any rock and roll genre shy of metal, and skilful enough to bring it together with a tongue-in-cheek playful underpinning.
