The Proper Ornaments - Wooden Head

The Proper Ornaments
Wooden Head
8 July 2014
Slumberland/Fortuna Pop

3 stars out of 5

 

The Proper Ornaments is a project of James Hoare, guitarist of the London-based Veronica Falls, and Max Claps, whose epic tale of escape from pending institutionalization in his native Argentina is a whole novel in and of itself. The two met while Claps was trying to distract Hoare at the shop he worked at in London so that Claps’s girlfriend could steal a pair of boots. In an ideal world, a story like this is good enough to warrant a five-star review, but life really isn’t that easy. This one gets a three, for reasons I shall reveal in the following paragraphs.

“Neo-psychedelia” is a term that seems to get slapped on anything that appears to be even remotely drug-influenced, and frankly isn’t very helpful. Face it, that definition could mean anything from minimalist techno to stoner metal to Spacemen 3, so as a genre label, “neo-psychedelia” is rather defective. I personally prefer the following rule: does it sound like nerdy English kids in the ‘80s trying to rewrite Sgt. Pepper? Yes? Then it’s neo-psychedelia. The Proper Ornaments ain’t that, which isn’t anything wrong in and of itself. Joy Division never attempted to sound like The Beatles and they were fucking amazing, after all. So what do The Proper Ornaments sound like? Like an intentionally lo-fi, simplified take on the late ‘60s psychedelic rock scene. There’s some good hooks here (“Sun,” “Now I Understand”), and a very carefully constructed sound—the band manages to sound like The Velvet Underground and Yo La Tengo without any of the eccentricities that made those legendary bands interesting—but most of what remains is the artifice and superficial mechinations of a pair of poseurs.

Harsh? Possibly, but still better than if they actually felt this music in their souls rather than were cynically trying to cash in on some gullible hippy demographic’s weakness for shitty pot-smoking soundtracks. This is a rare case where cynicism would be preferable—at least they could just shave and shower in the morning and pretend to know nothing about the whole thing.

reviewed by Richard Krueger