LEGENDARY PINK DOTS - Your Children Placate You From Premature Graves

Riding on a career spanning over two decades, marked by tireless live activity and an almost pachydermic output, the "legendary" Anglo-Dutch band led by the mad Edward Ka-Spel churns out yet another album full of unpredictable pop-psychedelic detours.

This is the third album they've released this year alone, not counting the two (unless we're forgetting something) put out by their leader under his own name. But beware: while such prolificacy inevitably makes it hard to keep up with their output (so forgive me if the following statements are based on less than complete knowledge of their monstrous discography), it by no means implies that quality has ever really suffered — quite the opposite.

Proof of that comes with "Your Children Placate You From Premature Graves" (a brilliant title!), which among their most recent works is perhaps the one that best illustrates the LPD method. The album carries all the flaws typical of their art (a bit too much prolixity and eccentricity that doesn't always live up to its intentions), yet it doesn't fail to showcase their strengths: elegance, a taste for arrangements, and the almost unique charm in which they manage to wrap every one of their extravagances.

A perfect example of the contradictions stirring Ka-Spel and co.'s creativity is a track like "Peace Of Mind", which stumbles along from every direction before suddenly rearing up into a wonderful crescendo caressed by Niels Van Hoorn's sax. Likewise, "The Made Man's Manifesto" starts off shaky before morphing into a relentless psychedelic free-for-all.

Schizophrenic pop fantasies like "Feathers At Dawn", torn between flamenco and Beatles-esque marches, leave a few doubts, but it's when the band surrenders to lysergic climbs towards Nirvana, as in "No Matter What You Do", that they're at their best. Luminous psychedelia enriched by a fertile undergrowth of spectral electronic effects.

On "The Island Of Our Dreams" Ka-Spel carries on undeterred paying tribute to his idol Syd Barrett and his sweetest, most lopsided ballads, but as enjoyable as it is, the track also turns out to be the most predictable, and only in its enchanted finale does it manage to reawaken the magic of their best moments: the same magic that glows in the effects-laden, lulling whispers of "Stigmata", for instance. And also in the wobbly folk dirge "Bad Hair", which however runs two or three minutes too long.

Finally, there's room for "A Silver Thread", a haunted-house track that traps Nurse With Wound's collages and the noir abulia of the more experimental Tuxedomoon, while, in league with the hallucinated romanticism of "Your Number Is Up", it closes the record on cryptic, dark tones, proving quite captivating.

Between highs and lows, then, this new effort confirms that Niels Van Hoorn (sax), Martijn de Kleer (bass and guitar), Ka-Spel (vocals and keyboards) and Phil "The Silverman" Knight (electronic alchemy) remain, as ever, an exceptional outfit.

Blissfully indifferent, for better or worse, to the passing of time, Pink Dots press on undeterred along their own dazed and utterly singular path.

Still fully deserving of the utmost respect.

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19/10/2006