The Go! Team - Rolling Blackouts (Memphis Industries)

With 3 years under their belts from releasing second LP Proof Of Youth, The Go! Team boys and girls are back with yet another brassy cut, featuring a wealth of new and established talent, and that signature filmic panorama of elements, settings and ideas. It is difficult to say that the sextet have strayed far from their previous releases, mainly because their usual style and flair is so varied in itself, the fluidity they create has become their own genre.

Opening with ‘T.O.R.N.A.D.O’, a lean mean and beastie track, we are thrown straight into the indelibly hip-hop business-at-hand lyrics of their in-house MC, Ninja. Speedy breaks and tough beats set-up a bold canvas, full of an energy that colours the rest of the coming 12 were expecting. With guest vocalist Dominique Young Unique appearing on tracks such as ‘Apollo Throwdown’ and ‘Voice Yr Choice’, there is an unmistakable air of sass. Each track is peppered with background noises such twisted police sirens and group chants from girls, giving the feel a pedestrian of watching it all go down on a street corner. Twinned with the lilting refrain within the backbeat of ‘Apollo…’ and the chorus of trumpets and flutes in ‘Voice…’, and you have yourself a cinematic experience all in the mind’s eye (and ears).

Continuing this thematic movie-world view, ‘Bust Out Brigade’ and ‘The Running Range’ carve out big-band licks and strong rhythm guitar structures that wouldn’t be out of place in a 1970’s heist movie. Hailed in a flurry of brass instruments, bass-notes and driving riffs, these tracks are to be cultivated at parties forever. However, perhaps instrumental efforts ‘Super Triangle’ and ‘Yosemite Theme’ shouldn’t be overlooked for their pure structures. The first, heavy on the synth, is simplistic and charming with maracas holding a steady pace, through which the flute weaves and wanes. The second, a pure harmonica driven triumph, evokes tales of the prairie. Each has its own bold movement and energy.

Even in tones of ‘Ready To Go Steady’, which is more emphatically ballad-like, the energy is palpable. Lead vocalist for this track, guest Bordeaux ‘Balladeer’ Lispector, brings a softer edge of harmonies to the album, which can also be tracked into ‘Secretary Song’, performed by Salomi Matsuzaki of Deerhoof. We could go on with the name-dropping... and will! Bethany Cosentino from Best Coast also donates her dulcet tones for title track ‘Rolling Blackouts’ and ‘Buy Nothing Day’, reaping an unmistakable softness in both rather brittle nineties Indie-style tracks.

‘Back Like 8 Track’, with its soulful steel drum timbre and customary sunshine stamp within samplers skillfully etched throughout, characterizes in 3.49 minutes just what The Go! Team is reaching for. Their ability to create visions of their/our musical past and present is not simply an attempt to re-hash what has come before, but an intelligent love of the elements, and an exploration of their worth. With strains of hip-hop, pop, old Indie, psychadelia, and Rap, wrapped up with sweeping orchestral overtures, the sextet manage to create the same effect as that of an orchestra, where these elements compliment and contrast, springing forward and falling back within a well choreographed production.