The Vickers - "She's Lost" on Cybertree Records / Foolica Records

I get a lot of my ideas about the world through singles. Take The Vickers out of Florence for example, what would a contemporary band sound like from the sinking city of canals and old paintings? Classical orchestral jams perhaps? Renaissance faire soundtracks? How about pop-psych garage, a real freakout of effects and layered guitars from this four piece exporting a futuristic processed haze.

"She's Lost" opens on piles of ambience interrupted by a bass line, real clean, Flaming lips clean. A haze of guitars roars in creeping louder and louder over the regular beat and steady piston bass. Just every shade of echo and reverb, they really hit on some super crazy effects here, next level type of technical psych. Bizarre loops and vocal distances are folded over and wormholed together. Crisp and clean like the antiseptic utopian future. The old psych is a crazy memory if they were ever referencing it at all. They have a stanglehold on every trick, the way the drum space changes, the way the guitars are working with every spectrum of wave in outer space. Some incredible sounds here, if there's a way to actually alter someones thinking with sound alone these guys are nearly there. If Radiohead attempted some kind of psych cover it would end up sounding a lot like this. Real heavy craft and singleminded precision here. They've spent countless hours reworking sound. Like some crazy blacksmith shop of the future, making laser swords out of iron.

B-Side's "All I Need" has thick pounding toms open into a warble chorus guitar jangle joined by another guitar swirl. The drums dominate on this one, feedback angles in haunting and filling the empty space with a blast. The psych is just as heavy but a little more organic on this side not as mathematical. When this drops down to vocals and drums, it even references a garage sound, dirtier and raw. The dense haze of psych guitar rules this pretty quickly though and once it joins the party it takes over the primitive side and launches straight into outer space. They keep coming back to this heavy beat that tries unsuccessfully to ground this thing, but it's way too high.

You'll have to import this from the band direct on their bandcamp page.