Illegal Teenage Bikini
I Am Not Job
WTLL Records
I admit I grabbed this because of the title, and it’s not at all as imagined. Never mind my personal hallucinations, this is a dark, complex album, with strong and mysterious religious overtones. With a deep, fuzzed up guitar behind all the songs, one has to listen carefully to the dirge-like rhythm to detect a hint of actual 3/4 time. Why is this man (Patrick Ogle) asserting his lack of similarity to the biblical hero of patience in the face of adversity? He holds that his faith can move mountains, and divine intervention is real, but is in a bit of a hurry. Perhaps we are all in too much hurry, or perhaps we don’t believe in anything that doesn’t happen quickly enough to make a sound bite. Offering a key to the mystery is a nice cover of the Billy Bragg tune “Between the Wars”, rendered by a crisp and moving 12 string. Billy seeks salvation from government, and seems a bit disappointed when it doesn’t happen as the union promised. It seems as if Ogle’s hope for the world is as promised in biblical terms, and he’d like it to arrive while he’s still around to enjoy it. In my mind, that’s a tough bet and a hard one to claim even if you win it. Defiantly not dance music, this is a Thinking Man’s Goth, dark, muddy, but with reason behind it. Reason, yes, if only we have the eyes to see it.
WTL Distribution: http://www.wtllrecords.com • Illegal Teenage Bikini: http://www.illegalteenagebikini.com
