Pond - 9 Review
Pond went deep-diving into previously uncharted territory to find experimental psych-treasures.
For the past, almost, ten years, Pond has been a go-to band for proper polished psych-pop. Not bothered by the overbearing success of their sister band, Tame Impala, they’ve continued smoothly on their own musical path. Two years after their last voyage into the unknown on ‘Tasmania’, Pond wandered even further to come back with, followed by hours of improvisation, new album, ‘9’.
‘Frail as people and innocent as lines/Between the islands rocking me to white’ goes eluding opening line sang by Maud Nadal in ‘Song For Agnes’, a tribute to Agnes Martin inspired by a letter she wrote to her art dealer. They marry ethereal psych-chamber sounds with harder-hitting bass to transcribe the power and tranquillity of her paintings into music. Pond transfers that strange emotionality to ‘Human Touch’, a surprisingly funky, satire on the human need for connection, sex or both. It reminds of buzzy and vibrating Beck on Midnite Vultures, only much more indecisive as the lyrics go: ‘I wanna be static, static, static/Ecstatic’. The beat and sense of humour stay on for ‘American Cup’, a groovy standout on gentrification and toxic masculinity. Despite some smoothed out distortion in the background, it flows like a stream you’d never want to get out of but continue swim with its current for at least a couple of plays. They’ve found a way to make nostalgia hip again.
As we’re already on a memory lane, there’s no better track to take there than ‘Take Me Avalon I’m Young’. Nick immortalized the Glastonbury land where he went for some soul-searching on a gap year. We relive the myth of England as a country running rich with acid, free love and rebellion as apparently there’s one goal before us - ‘We're here to finger God/With dirty dreams and they're done dirt cheap’. It's all the things that youth is. Dirty, dramatic and a bit delusional. We’re dazzled. After the age of confusion, ‘Pink Lunettes’ calls for some reflection and realizing that maybe the golden days are already behind us. All we can do is chase shadows. Even if it’s to flashy and gritty sounds, wild layers clashing in the background and Leonard Cohen cross-looped with Richter and Documenta X. In comparison to this unholy mess, ‘Czech Locomotive’ sounds all too familiar. The ode to world-famous runner Emil Zátopek and praise of his romantic spirit and willpower was born as a result of impro session. It’s cute but blends in.
Luckily, ‘Rambo’ storms in to save the day. Pond takes the piss at the pretence-ridden and Rimbaud praising art spheres. It feels like an album manifesto and a concept crystallised in one track. They’re at the same time distanced and cynical when colliding with some of the modern mindsets though deep down terrified of what’s to come. Maybe the best way of surviving this era is escaping and waiting it out, ‘I should run and hide/Or die in the generational divide’. For those who can’t be bothered to flee anymore, there’s ‘Gold Cup/Plastic Sole’. Stretched-out, brilliant chord progression accompanies haunting piano and strings. It’s a cry for the worst of pop culture and longing for a paradise lost even though we might not be sure what is or if it ever was.
In the end, we ‘Toast’ to the most ridiculous human cases – money hoarders, climate change deniers and adventure capitalists. It’s like watching the sunset with your loved one while the world is falling apart. Still, romantic. Pond was brave enough to take most beautiful melodies and turn them into, well, something else. Something pretty amazing.
On ‘9’, Perth psych-rockers go scouting to the different genres’ camps and come back with a bag filled with twisted chords and unexpected comparisons. Their comfort zone is based in a state of flux so we never know what to expect. This time we got a full load of experimental gems glued together into a surrealistic collage of an album and topped with sacrum-meet-streets kind of poetry. If, as ‘Rambo’ suggests, Pond never read Rimbaud, please don’t. You’re perfect the way you are.