DAVID BARDON and Oscar Robertson have been burrowing quietly into the London psych scene since 2017 as the surreally and aptly named Sunglasses For Jaws.
By day, they’re a readymade rhythm section for hire, touring the world in the business of fleshing out other people’s sound, But they’re currently more psyched right now (in both inflections) by the news that they’ve got a new album, the eerily titled Everybody’s Made Of Bones, out come high summer on Pony Recordings; which conceptual world they’re pulling up the curtains on today, with a peek at a single drop, “Walk Me Home”.
“Sunglasses For Jaws is our vessel to experiment and make any kind of music we want to,” the duo say.
“This time we’ve given it a lot more intention and thought, and we wanted to create an entire little world.” Step forward collaborating vocalist Olivier Huband and a new character – Frank, whom Olivier inhabits for the record.
“Frank is a deluded paranoid schizophrenic, essentially,” David and Oscar explain.
“He believes that he’s in a film, but he’s not, just like everyone thinks that they’re in a film in their own head. Really though, it’s a man having a nervous breakdown.
“It’s an exploration of method acting and having an existential crisis in this role you’re playing. It’s a bit meta and in the rabbit hole!”
Frank makes his first appearance in the world at large in the organ- hipswinging, vocally caressing groove of “Take Me Home” – the video, which you can watch below, abounding with odd characters. Who will take who home, and what occurs?
David and Oscar explain: “The concept behind the song is that of temptation. Of making a decision that could have disastrous consequences.
“But, just as Eve plucked the Apple from the Tree, we want to take our own risks and taste our own apples. And those risks seem even more exciting when they’re forbidden. Who knows what could happen. What could change. How you could feel. You’ll never know unless you try it.
“So I’d just say this: don’t go home with strangers … unless you want to.”
That song has all the right psych glimmer, in service to a tune; it’s like coming up on acid, when you begin to catch the flicker and flame of other realities and colours out of the corner of your eye. It’s a little bit MGMT, but is that the whisper-smooth vocal quality of Ultra Vivid Scene’s Kurt Ralske I’m hearing in there too?
The single and album were put together at Sean Ono Lennon’s studio in upstate New York by his partner Charlotte Kemp Muhl, who together form The Ghost Of A Saber Tooth Tiger, after a brace of random encounters with the couple.
Sounds like Frank’s world may be one it’d be worth getting acquainted with, for sure.
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