Moonface – Organ Music Not Vibraphone Like I'd Hoped

Moonface is a non-de-plume of Wolf Parade’s Spencer Krug, adding another entry to a catalogue of acts long enough to fill this review’s word-count. While the tremulous vocals make it recognisably Krugian (the guy surely deserves his own adjective by now), it occupies an idiosyncratic place in his networked discographies.

Its five tracks (only one of which stops short of seven minutes) are played solo on (surprise) an organ, with the aid of loops and a digital drums, and what apparently started out as “lush and noisy” drone experiments has instead produced an off-kilter pop album unmoored to any specific period or genre.

Fast Peter carries a resemblance to OMD, Shit-Hawk In The Snow’s latter half invokes Ray Manzarek’s prog-years, while the whole’s simplified methodology bears comparison to aspects of Casiotone For the Painfully Alone. Even at thirty-seven minutes, the circumscribed aesthetic eventually exhausts, but Organ Music… is nonetheless an engrossing curveball. [Chris Buckle]