[rating=3.50]
The Brian Jonestown Massacre has always been something of freewheeling, psychedelic experiment perhaps suited best to the cultural milieu of Haight-Asbury circa 1966. Headed by Anton Newcombe and now based in the ever-artistic Berlin, Germany, BJM rotates band members, with alumni forming stalwarts like Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, The Black Angels, and The Raveonettes.
Constantly experimenting with a mélange of sounds and styles, Aufheben finds the band cooly combining an instrumental hybrid of modern garage rock, moody electronics, eastern-influenced dub-lite, and Velvet Underground cool. This music slithers and shimmies with a groovy and hazy self-assurance. As the band dives into dark corners and opium-like atmospherics, they remain committed to serving the cohesion of individual songs. Produced as another in its long line of solid releases, Newcombe has to be recognized again as a creative force to be reckoned with.
“Aufheben” is a German word that is diversely difficult to define. With meanings such as “to lift up”, “to transcend”, “to preserve” and “to abolish”, the band highlights a word that Hegel explained as the “result of interaction between thesis and antithesis”. We often struggle to give words to the visceral and emotional experience of music and the meaning of music can only be embedded in the sonic experience itself. Where language fails, music begins.
Aufheben begins with “Panic In Babylon”, a nervous, jaunty number carried by its staunchly grooving underbelly. Relatively representative of the album as a whole, a driving and infectious organ/horn/sitar line sets a heady tone as an acoustic guitar and the tug of electronic harmonics float over the top. The song degenerates into monkey laughter and we acknowledge Newcombe’s ever-present trickster tendencies. The next three songs up the ante on this Day-Glo garage rock vibe, digging deep musical trenches for the band to explore.
Newcombe’s behavior in the 2004 documentary DIG remains a thorn in the band’s side, one that continues to carry the consequence of some viewing him as self-important and pretentious. There is little doubt that Newcombe is all in when it comes to BJM releases, and has taken some mis-steps (see 2008’s My Blood Underground). Nonetheless he is constantly pushing the limits of song structure and on Aufheben the band has made an unflappable and cohesive record. “Face Down on the Moon” may be the highpoint by combining infectious sitar and flute lines with rumbling bass work and rock chord progression; the band embodies a little Tortoise, a little Broken Social Scene, and a lot of Anton Newcombe.
"Blue Order New Monday” carries a massive groove to finish Aufheben but simply goes on far too long. This is orchestrated post-trip hop, indie-rock, almost a mix of an Americanized Air vs. MGMT. Relying on one keyboard line to a mind-numbing degree the album finishes on an unfortunate low point: the song would be far more powerful if it was four minutes shorter.
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