It seriously tickles me when an artist gives their project a name that doubles as an accurate descriptor of the kind of art they are making. This type of "as advertised" delivery and nomenclature is extremely rare in experimental music but it's a good sign when you see it. These types of naming conventions usually correlate with some actual vision for the project and indicate that it isn't going to be a waste of your time and attention.
Oakland's Headboggle is, as I hope I've led you to expect, a bit of a brain torque. Their sound, as of the release of their second LP Digital Digital Analog, is an incredibly nimble and curious exploration of synth technology inspired primarily by popular music forms of the mid-20th Century, specifically '70s funk. Yes, you read that right. We are miles away from the nightmare scenario of an art instructor subjecting his students to his recital where he forces fart noises out an old Yamaha and contemplates Joseph Beuys's 7000 Oaks.* Trust that I would never subject you to such a thing myself. I Thought I Heard A Sound is a safe place from such pretensions.
Headboggle is definitely making experimental music, but it is clearly of the variety that is meant to be easily engaged with and (god forbid!) enjoyed. Digital Digital Analog is similar in character and aesthetic to the kinds of progressive and collective-power-oriented psychedelia promoted and distributed by Hausu Mountain in that it seems to want to directly speak to the listener in a way that will be intelligible. These communications can certainly be perplexing, peculiar and chaotic at times, but I believe that they are meant to be largely legible, even if they are a form of conversation that defies normal linguistic parameters.
There is also an obvious sense of humor present on these tracks that lends to them a certain infectious vibrancy. They remind me of the way Thundercat will lean into chatty and informal melodies with exaggerated transitions to draw out the comedic value of his music. Similarly, on Digital Digital Analog, I often am confronted with the sense that I'm listening to a cartoon character's dialogue after it's been fed into an AI that interprets speech patterns as compositional notations and spits out a twisty and elastic melody.
It's highly amusing... and moody! But not in a '90s grunge or even '80s goth-rock kind of way (although I doubt the Headboggle's composer would object to such comparisons). The album is instead moody in the sense that each track is able to establish a specific feeling and sensory profile, and then manages to explore it thoroughly to achieve a point of catharsis- often in less time then it takes to half-thaw a microwavable burrito.
Everything I've written here may just be me looking for a thousand different ways to say that Headboggle's music is satisfyingly expressive and that this quality is something that I admire about it, but that's kind of the game here. To help lead you, the reader, to an understanding by showing you the twists and turns, and the whirl of the gears in my own mind as I come to terms with a piece of art. And Digital Digital Analog has given me a lot of fuel for this process. If you're someone who values imagination and likes the idea of a creative process being pushed to its limits of cohesion without giving way to angst or alienation, then I'd recommend letting Digital Digital Analog into whatever zone you're occupying today. You won't regret it.
Ratskin Records put this out on their label.
