This spring break was a rediscovery of life, love and most importantly myself. Important life lessons were learned as mistakes were repeated, reviewed, relived and relished over plastic cups of gin and ginger ale indoors and out. But I am supposed to review a record, not waste space on such trivialities as how I spent my spring break. So I’ll take the easy way out and tell you about “Bromst,” the new Dan Deacon album off of Carpark as if the album were the soundtrack to my spring break.
The mantra “SB ’09: So fine!” started off the break with a sense of insecurity but would eventually build momentum and become a proud phrase to be shouted out of cars on various road trips. You see, I was the mastermind behind the rhyme, but I was too afraid to share it with my life partner Graham in the very beginning. I was concerned with how he would respond. It certainly wasn’t as good as his “Spring Break ’06, show us your tits!”
“Bromst” seems to start off with a similar insecurity. Dan Deacon starts off his album with a similar anxiety, hoping that his newest venture will be able to stand up to his last album, “Spiderman of the Rings,” which was something outrageously fun and electro-poppy. The first 30 seconds of “Build Voice” are a hesitant silence leading, eventually, into the faintest whisper of music. So far, so good. Then the words become faintly audible, building up into a confidence that “Bromst” will be even better than “SB ’09 – So fine” could ever be.
Then the album gets going with spastic dance beats and high pitched vocals that inspire nothing less than a crispy clear desire to jump on top of anybody else that thinks they are going to be having fun with you. Like drinking gin without knowing how it is going to affect you, the album is surprisingly intoxicating.
The fourth track, “Snookered,” is without a doubt, the best song of the album and likely to be one of my favorites of the year. My play counter doesn’t even come close to comprehending how many times I’ve listened to this song and just been inspired to do something stupid just to make sure that the night will end in tears. Dan Deacon turns off whichever one of the myriad of wires and switches that makes his voice sound like a chipmunk and clearly states that he has “been wrong so many times before, but never quite like this (incoherent mumble) I’m in the rain, but the rain all turned to piss.” I just want to howl to this song and throw water at pedestrians from a moving car at pedestrians accusing them of living in Fart City!
As a whole, “Bromst” stays true to the pop sensibilities of “Spiderman of the Rings” while evolving into a somewhat more mature and self-conscious entity layered in so many instruments and effects that gives the listener so many different ways and reasons to drink and freak out.