Modey Lemon - 'Season Of Sweets' (Birdman) Released 23/06/08

Taking time out from a gruelling touring schedule, Pittsburgh’s Modey Lemon are back after a three-year hiatus with their fourth long-player, ‘Season Of Sweets’ which is built on a band that have jammed their way to something quite simply ****ing brilliant.

Mounting their attack with ‘The Bear Comes Back Down The Mountain’ the trio pitch keyboard against guitar as Paul Quatrone’s relentless punch-bag drumming announces the bands take no prisoners approach. ‘The Peacocks Eye’ and ‘It Made You Dumb’ create a frenzy of hypnotic schizophrenia that sounds something like a witch doctor exorcising a guitar and the stunning use of timing and sonic maelstrom it creates is as intense as you could hope to get.

‘Sacred Place’ is perhaps the most affecting five minutes of the album, the isolated distortion and fuzz of a predatory bass keeping you on constant alert. As if to reward you for this emotional stalking, ‘Become A Monk’ seamlessly walks the knife-edge of pop until, its own insatiable appetite becomes too much to hold and it consumes itself in the psychedelic designs of ‘Ice Fields’. At this point of the album the band best demonstrate their intimate knowledge of each other’s music and their skill in manipulating time and tempo.

Modey Lemon aren’t a band to do things by halves and ‘Milk Moustache’ and the albums title track begin without warning like a frantic unprovoked attack. Either that or the sound engineer forgot to press play and record until halfway through. The album concludes with ten minutes of ‘Live Like Kids’, which once more hypnotically builds into an immense climax before slowing to what sounds like the instruments catching their breath. ‘Season Of Sweets’ is a chaotic, superiorly intense non-stop ride of garage rock genius from a band that sound more like a battle scarred marauding army than a trio. There are potential side effects from listening to this album, but the risk of personal injury is well worth the gamble.