Opossom
-
Electric Hawaii
published: 14 /
8 /
2012
Label:
Fire Records
Format: CD
Sunny psychedelic-tinged indie rock on debut album from Opossom, the project of New Zealand-based musician Kody Neilson, who is also the front man with art punks the Mint Chicks
Review
Opossom is the brainchild of New Zealand native Kody Nielson, who is the front man with art punks the Mint Chicks. This is one of several extra curricular ventures and sees him delving into the self confessed ‘mental escape from daily life’, and drawing on his inner ‘Nocturnal instinctive animal’. With gorgeous lead single ’Blue Meanies’, I would say that is a fair way to describe it.
There is a real comfort to the sound Opossum create. ‘Girl’ welcomes you in nicely, sounding to me like a very refined and upbeat Stone Roses but with a heavy use of organs and keys, rather than guitars and the likes.
With help from bass player and fellow Mint Chick Michael Logie and multi instrumentalist Bic Runga, Opossum really come to life as a band, rather than being simply some dude sat in his home studio, particularly on tunes like ‘Watchful Eye’ and ‘Cola Elixir’, both of which straddle a nice line between the psychedelic and the straight up indie-rock band.
My two favourite moments come in the form of the uber catchy’Why Why’ which a chorus with a hook a fisherman would be proud of, and the sublime title track ’Electric Hawaii’ which just oozes sunshine and I would say this track really captures the essence of Opossum best.
The album finishes with a real monster of a song, but a big friendly monster that you wouldn’t be scared of, in the form of ‘Inhaler Song’ with an intense and hypnotic verse which crashes into an unholy and noisy chorus.
Track Listing:-
1
Girl
2
Fly
3
Blue Meanies
4
Getaway Tonight
5
Watchful Eye
6
Why Why
7
Cola Elixir
8
Electric Hawaii
9
Outer Space
10
Inhaler Song
Band Links:-
https://www.facebook.com/The-Mint-Chic
http://www.themintchicks.com/
Label Links:-
https://twitter.com/firerecordings
https://www.facebook.com/Firerecords
http://www.firerecords.com/
https://firerecords.bandcamp.com/
https://instagram.com/fire_records/
https://www.youtube.com/user/Firerecor