Album Review: Thee Oh Sees - Floating Coffin

Hot on the heels of last year's Putrifiers II comes Floating Coffin – the latest offering from the highly prolific San Franciscan outfit, Thee Oh Sees, and their fourteenth overall.

Not interested in easing you into the record, John Dwyer and co push you into the deep end with I Come From The Mountain, a track full of reckless abandon that has you hooked before you know what's happened. The pace doesn't slow down until halfway through Floating Coffin with the fuzz-heavy Strawberries 1 + 2. This provides an opportunity to pull yourself together after the high-paced aural assault of the previous four tracks. It doesn't last long, though, with things picking right back up with Maze Fancier. Tunnel Time is a definite highlight that easily stands out and manages to snap your brain out of a wall-of-sound haze and back to attention. Minotaur is an oddity in that it is unlike anything else on this record and has a strong Pixies vibe going on, especially with Brigid Dawson's Kim Deal-esque backing vocals.

The cover art for Floating Coffin may not be pretty, but it certainly is in keeping with the cover art of the band's previous releases. Having said that, the blurred collage of strawberries, eyes and gnashed dog teeth does suit the music within in some warped way.

Thee Oh Sees' brand of wigged-out, psychedelic-drenched garage rock has worked well for them over the years and continues to do so. Floating Coffin will not disappoint old fans and will blow away new ones, and, as we've come to expect from this intriguing outfit, is chock-full of garage-fuelled goodness.