Floating di Morel – Goal Less Play / Said My Say

Play Loud!

Floating di Morel‘s Goal Less Play LP is a sparse, spittle-mouthed wonder nuzzling into some glinting sparks of acoustika. Bursts of sonic weirdness lurk between the main feasts – brief sketches that clear the palette for the more song-oriented goods, some of which are stripped-back and glowing bone-white, others rhythmically fleshed out with juddering disco vibes or chaotically itching with cackling hysterics.

Liking its sketchbook (and slightly haphazard) approach. The simple knit of the fabric as the nonchalant vocals contrast-flip with that guitar sparkle. The jippering frets chewing through some wobbly headed dog toy on side one, smeared in a drizzle of symphonic samplation. The trumpet-nibbled bits that end the the first side giving over a Fausty-fringed furrier that gets you instantly flipping over for more. An action that’s rewarded in the disco-juggering delights of “Sheriff”, some lovely chaotic colour that kilter-scuffles through the remaining in fleshy gymnastics or falls around drunkenly. But they are best when they slur the caboodle up at notch and churn on dirge-fully, that accompaniment of distended Davis-like trumpet just adding a cherry to the vibe.

Said My Say is fuller-sounding, maimed in a malware of preset judder and neo-folk spark (without the prejudice), that dry curl of vox from Kai Drewitz and Sabine Blödorn chaffing the candy. A lot of this just drifts in there, keels leisurely round the skull on the simplest of melodies, a minimal vibe that hooks you up in some crooked popsicle repeats. It’s a bit awkward in places, but that’s never a bad thing.

Thorsten Neu‘s guitar is omnipresent, churning over the goods all jangle-jewelled, chipping the china, shadow-chopping the rather wonderful “Slumtary Gibly” – a digi-dotted binary bite driven on a mono-chromed numbness. The comedic jiver of “Olbrit” that sounds like Der Plan skipping out to his driven frets. Then when you think you have them marked, Floating di Morel inject a bit of industrial into the mix with an atonal gunning of your ears on “Ois”, echo-slurred on corneting slurries peppering in brief verbal snippets, later to be found panthering a smoky room with seekyooo’s.

I’m glad things like this exist – an antidote to all that polished vocoded nonsense that shows little sign of disappearing anytime soon.

-Michael Rodham-Heaps-

Play Loud! has a special package of Goal Less Play, Said My Say and ulf / fdm on vinyl plus the VOD concert film A Summer Evening With Floating di Morel available here.