The Peculiar Pretzelmen - One Day Even All Your Enemies Will Die (Chapter One)

 

The Pretzelmen are without a doubt one of my current fave bands around, especially in a live setting - so glad that they made it to Vegas on their current tour - but I also dig every one of their prolific recordings. Per Kevin, they had planned to go into a studio just as Covid hit, so of course everything was postponed and by the time they did get back in, they had enough material for three albums, which they will be releasing over time, hence the sub-title of "Chapter One".

Here, they continue with their Tom Waits-ian sounds, but continue to add their own unique bits'n'pieces, from Deacon's percussion kit made up of bicycle'n'car parts, to Kevin's homemade instruments and pseudo-rap trappings. Layers of cacophonous, rhythmic noise back Kevin extortions of "can you make a fist?" (for your enemies? I'm not sure) and some rapped, distorted and effect-laden lyrics about freeing yourself in "Boombox Preacher" before moving to a quieter interlude of "One Day...", followed by a looped, banjo-picked "Velvet in the Morning" that includes multiple sonic waves cascading over you while "Toybox Mechanics" has echo-y static and a simple, repeated instrumental melody line as another interlude and "Please Stop" is an even shorter lull.

A song that translates easier into a live setting (other than the string overdubs) is simply titled "Dissonance", with Kevin's melodic pickin'n'singin' while Deacon desecrates his percussion set, then another almost ambient intermission in "Another Day" before returning with "Brujo At The Door", an exotic, Eastern-sounding backing by Deacon and an ocarina (?) that Kevin raps over. "Pollution Solution #1" is again driven by Deacon's always interesting'n'different percussion and Kevin's slide guitar, starts'n'stops, and truly unique songwriting, that ends the album in a mash of echo-laden noise.

Again, I love what these guys are doing and have dug every single release of theirs and this is no exception - looking forward to hearing the next two chapters!