Fol Chen - Part II: The New December (Asthmatic Kitty)

This follow-up to Fol Chen’s quirkily-named 2009 debut Part I: John Shade, Your Fortune’s Made - it’s a concept album but let’s not go into the ‘story’ too deeply, eh? - continues the LA band’s peculiarly charming brand of musical collage in generally fine style.

Helmed by Samuel Bing and Julian Wass, Fol Chen dive into a ragtag of quirky sounds to build ear-catching musical collages - many taken from musical fragments fed through the sampler of an old Casio - that somehow bring unity to disjointedness and frayed edges.

As you listen, echoes crop up of a melange of various distinctive folk. The jerky jaunt of 'The Holograms', for example, sounds like a proggy take on The Notwist or uber-cool Canadians Oen Sujet.

Other tracks sound like a more off-kilter and eclectic Stereolab - 'In Ruins', with its gorgeous sultry vocals by LA chanteuse Karin Tatoyan, and the sweet angular pop of 'Adeline' with vocals by Simone White.

Hood spring to mind on the fey-but-potent title track, while there’s a nod to none other than Prince in the falsetto vocal and pretty noodling of 'Your Curtain Call' - not so outlandish perhaps given the band’s previous cover of His Purpleness’s 'The Beautiful Ones'.

Other standouts include 'Men, Beasts or Houses', whose discordant strings and fairground keyboards are like a soundtrack to a whispered dark woods fairytale, along with the strident strut of 'This Is Where The Road Belongs' with its mix of sturdy drumbeats, brass and electro noodles.

Fol Chen are hard to pin any easy tag too, with pundits groping for odd adjectival pairings like ‘chamber funk’. I’d call it a blend of hazy psychedelia and proggy electro folk. Whatever it is, it’s distinctive and engaging.