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White Williams - Smoke
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Off-kilter electro-pop is the name of the game on this debut album from Cleveland one-man band White Williams. Sadly eschewing the traditional apparatus of a bass drum on the back and a pair of cymbals round the knees, he instead makes lo-fi, tatty-round-the-edges synth pop – in his bedroom, by the sounds of things.
Opener ‘Headlines’ is something like a cut-price Roxy Music – maybe if Brian Eno had played battered and broken Fisher Price toys instead of elaborate thousand-keyed synthesisers. It’s catchy and irreverent, and an utter joy to behold – and unfortunately, represents a severe case of peaking too early. Everything that follows just doesn’t quite match up to it.
‘In The Club’ is nice enough, its plodding, Neanderthal drumming and tinny guitar sounding a bit like T Rex might have, had they been recorded on a £20 Matsui car-boot sale-purchased tape deck. ‘Violence’ is where scary New York synth-rockers Suicide meet ‘70s Giorgio Moroder-produced Moog poppers Chicory Tip, and brings to mind Lawrence from Felt’s short-lived homage to the decade that taste forgot, Denim.
‘Going Down’ is all Naked-era Talking Heads – African rhythms played badly on cheap instruments, and quite charming as a result – but as the record plays on, it becomes more and more self-indulgent and unlistenable. There’s pointless twaddle like ‘Smoke’ and ‘Lice in the Rainbow’ – five long, painful minutes each of self-indulgent synth noodling, they sound a bit like a toddler let loose in the Casio factory, only significantly less interesting.
However, closing with ‘Route to Palm’s sweet, almost Joe-Meek-esque feel, White Williams just about wins you round. A great EP stretched out to the length of an album.
Stewart Turner
