by Dan Goldin (@post_trash_)
Sydney, Australia’s Shrapnel have been making music since Sam Wilkinson (also of Mope City) started the project back in 2013. What began as a solo project has continuously increased over the years, expanded as needed to accomplish the lush, paisley, sound of the band’s exuberant psych-pop. Alasitas, the band’s upcoming fourth album, due out June 11th via Tenth Court (Ostraaly, Dom & The Wizards, Zipper) finds the band as a sextet with the addition of clarinet, acoustic guitar, and flute. For anyone just tuning into the band’s music, it can become hard to envision them any other way, as the heady mixture of those elements play a pivotal role in the sonic make-up of the record. There’s a flower wielding hippie vibe at times, but the record feels like it has more in common with the lo-fi of the early 90s than it does with the late 60’s, though the lines are certainly blurred.
Following the record’s lead single “Orpheum Protocol,” the band are sharing “POG Theme,” an unconventional choice for the second single, but a compelling one nonetheless. “POG Theme” is very much that, a theme, a musical introduction to the character, the idea, the embodiment of “POG” (aka Prisoners of Gravity). While the song is very much cohesive of the larger Alasitas picture, it’s an outlier in the fact that its the album’s only instrumental song, and in context, serves almost like an interlude in the grand scheme. Set very much in place by the mystical flute and clarinet performances, it feels like a moment of growth, like the wind picking up budding seeds and spreading them over the land. It’s slow and dreary, but light and calming, like a heavily guided meditation through a strange place and time.