It’s been noted elsewhere that Australia’s become a real Petri dish of underground musical microbes lately & that’s obviously fantastic but it seems a distinct majority of said action is in the punky/scrappy spectrum, energy-wise. Nothin’ wrong with that of course but we weren’t aware of slow-mo drone-blues outback fieldhands like Andrew Cowie aka Angel Eyes until he got in touch. And Dire Dish, the Melbourne musician’s debut full-length, is a special slice of loner-psych songsmithery, regardless of geography. Heavily refracted guitar lines twang and echo in the foreground while tranced keyboard tones shimmer like the northern lights above a plodding, rusted minimalist drum machine march. Eventually he steps up to the mic and the vocals boom out, low and somber and smeared across a shadowy reverb chamber dome. Four slowburn-style songs, all long and lonely and bathed in a twilit western mood that’s deeply affecting and not really reminiscent of anyone else we can think of – which is sort of our ultimate compliment. Our friends at Totem Tapes are working on his follow-up release so hopefully this is just chapter one of the Angel Eyes saga. Pro-dubbed and imprinted yellow tapes in cases with rainbow body scan artwork by Manda Beth Brown. Edition of 150.

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