Sons of Boy
Artist: Stationary Odyssey
Label: Joyful Noise Recordings
Time: 8 Tracks / 40 mins

First of all, what does this band say about themselves? Announcing the release, Stationary Odyssey claim that “Sons of Boy... will feature some of our strangest material to date;” while their PR promises “a somewhat genre-less album, Sons of Boy rides an undefined line somewhere between instrumental post-rock, punk, ambient, prog and grind.”

Yes, it is unusual; yes it does major on instrumental post-rock; and there is a bit of grind there, too. The only ambient is the aching soundscape of “Cherry Teeth (Baby Got)” and prog only appears if you count a brief askew impression of double-speed King Crimson without the clever bits. Neither are the electronics listed inside very noticeable. The impression that it leaves me with is of a proficient band with jazz-rock pretensions jamming while waiting for their vocalist and lead guitarist to arrive. So they do have mood changes and blocks of rhythm, but there is still that huge something missing that a vocalist or lead guitarist would fill – and I say that as someone who loves both good instrumental music and Talk Talk’s allegedly uncommercial Spirit of Eden.

Of the eight tracks, the standout one (both in impact and style) is the aptly named “Chunk Feeder Blues” which puts an industrial take on a traditional ground-out twelve-bar blues pattern. It reminded me of the growling part on the ‘back’ of the original Tubular Bells. More conventional than most tracks, it bisects the disc, and was probably put there to maintain interest, because by this stage I start to find the CD – though well-played and mixed clearly – less than satisfying.

Apart from the relatively pleasant opener, the other decent track is “Brand of Shame.” There are elements of twang in the first and, to a degree, the last tracks; but this is a twang-fest with a discernable theme that evokes spaghetti westerns.

I think the problem stems from the missing element: those who like melody will want it to appear over the backing-track-feel of what is here; those who want ambient will find this too noisy; those who want purposeful direction will often be frustrated; and those that want mood will find it a little too schizophrenic in places. If you like mildly industrial, guitar-based blocks of sound this may please you. While I enjoyed listening to it much of the time, I kept craving something more – not something predictable, but something that their potential hints at, if they were to be brave and put in a bit of constructive work, such as time changes or more inventive steps between the blocks. This doesn’t achieve any more than most albums that go conventionally in one direction or another. (Great cover though).

What they do, they do decently, but from a listener’s point of view, you’d be better off taking one of your favourite discs and playing it with one channel turned off.

Derek Walker