Oxygen Ponies “Harmony Handgrenade” (Hidden Target, 2009)

Saddle up for a trek into the musical danger zone

I’m a sucker for songs that hide their true identity until it bursts from the chrysalis transformed; ugly moth or beautiful butterfly it doesn’t much matter. These Ponies sensibly position ‘Love Yr Way’ at the start of the album. It starts with ooh’s and acoustic guitar, a bell, Paul Megna’s weary voice, hushed and whispering, and it follows this gentle course for three and a half minutes before huge speckled wings of noise unfurl, strings, horns; a whole beautiful cacophony of sound, an explosion of joy. It would mean nothing if it wasn’t followed up - ‘Fevered Cyclone’ uses the same elements, though in a more tempered way, spring shoots of horns sounding optimistic against the melancholy of Megna, the horns on ‘The War is Over’ more decadent and teasing.

With Megna’s deep voice and the dark subject matter it sounds like a recipe for gloom. Yet the title track is a kind of day-glo absurdist pop, over bright twinkling piano notes nonsense rhymes dispelling any thought of doom. More sombre is ‘Grab Yr Gun’ which reaches a kind of Primal Scream climax with female voices horns and a rock gospel feel. ‘Finger Trigger’ introduces some harder guitars, kind of like the Pixies or David Baker era Mercury Rev. There is something noteworthy about every track - ‘Tryna Get to Heaven’ simmers, and Megna rolls syllables around his cement mixer of a mouth and pours out smooth concrete words. The chorus of ‘Villans’ may only be ‘Oh, we got a long drive, home’ but there’s a lot of emotion contained in it and with the chatter of electronics and the precision of the guitar it builds up quite a charge - it's perhaps the best moment on the record.

There’s a consistency at work even though the songs are diverse they call on the same strings and horns each takes a different route. This is well crafted interesting work full of cynicism and hope and well worth your time.

Date review added:  Thursday, April 02, 2009
Reviewer:  David Cowling
Reviewers Rating:
Related web link:  No naysayers in here