Along with a slew of notable guest musicians that include Dosh, Andrew Bird, and Alan Sparhawk (Low), Fog have released an album of sometimes eerie, sometimes transcendent experimental pop with Ditherer.
The record starts out brightly with harmony-laden opener “We Will Have Vanished,” which sounds more like a psychedelic trip into outer space than rock and roll. One after another, the songs pull the listener through the strange world that is a Fog album; upbeat pop falls into somber darkness at a moment’s notice, while drawn out electro-pop speeds up into a full-on bleeping freakout.
They have perfected the art of flawless transition, making it easy for a nine-minute song to slip by without a second thought. The album becomes one seamless, hazy, and chaotic experience.
Lead singer Andrew Broder is especially talented at creating cleverly odd lyrics, adding to the general feeling of detached elation on the disc. “I am smothered in glistening chicken fat / on my mother’s bedspread / dreaming drawbridge openings / trying in vain to explain all this regret to myself,” Broder sings on “Inflatable Ape pt. 3,” and for a moment, amidst the clanging of a reckless cowbell and the feedback from a squealing electric guitar, it actually makes sense.
– Andrea Myers
Fog: www.fogtimewaster.com
Lex Records: www.lexrecords.com