Album Review: Memory Tapes – Grace/Confusion

Memory Tapes
Grace/Confusion
Carpark Records

Moments cascade to our memory, like food aromas to the palate, causing a sudden rapture within the soul as we wait to feast with uvula and tongue clamouring. We know not what is to happen, or if we will eat again. The memory is tricky like that; always keeping us on our toes, and that’s just it. Every breath and step taken adds a second layer of depth to this complicated puzzle, a maze which wraps around the world many times over. As we journey, momentous pressure shackles our feet, prompting us to listen. We now know there is more to this confusion than first thought. Others share our interest, it seems, lost within the same mindless trap, weaving melodies and bombasting instrumentals together in fragmented hooks. Dayve Hawk must be a sorcerer to cast such a spell as this, one where beauty and chaos unite.

It is as though the sounds carry us the farther we walk. Music is a sacred vessel after all, one of chariot and wings. Grace/Confusion harbours pools and lagoons stretching past the idiosyncratic, Krautrock horizon, where lovers dine and swoon before they are transported to bed.

Grace/Confusion is many things compiled into one. Space Rock and classical Electro, for example, experiment within the Pop genre, and it’s all on display here. “Neighborhood Watch” turns the gears on this multifaceted machine, complete with dramatic coda which leads into “Sheila” and all her affectionate abilities told over alternating suites.

Inspired from a young age by the legendary sounds of The Beatles and David Bowie, former grocery store employee Dayve Hawk would go on to form the dance-punk act Hail Society who received some international attention. That was then, this is now—a true call to memory.

J.R. Leyvas (Twitter @JRLeyvas) 

weirdtapes.blogspot.ca/