by Matt Watton (@brotinus)
Motherhood sounds like a band from outer space – and they might as well be, hailing from the distant climes of Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada. Their sound is an otherworldly blend of demented garage punk, fuzzed-out circus music, and arty surf rock. A hard-to-classify alien entity, they’re more Alf than Xenomorph: the songs are quirky and playful with an acerbic wit. With four albums under their belt (each new release better than the last), the trio has released their fifth statement. Thunder Perfect Mind encapsulates their alien sonics in what is both their most out-there and most accessible record yet.
Thunder Perfect Mind is a loose concept album narrating the sudden abduction of an unsuspecting pedestrian by a dark, expanding cloud. A lesser band would use this conceit as mere metaphor, but Motherhood is fully committed to the bit, creating a lyrical and sonic soundscape that feels as disorienting and exhilarating as a genuine alien encounter. The story is told not through straight-ahead narrative, but through cerebral songwriting, cutting guitar tones, and wayward keyboard vibes. The music compels the action forward just as much as singer Brydon Crain’s elusive lyrics. Things get serious on “Bok Globule,” an amalgam of shifting movements, whiplash tempo changes, and off-kilter rhythms. The guitar screeches and growls, the drums bounce and slam, vocals careen from anguished shouts to angelic chants. In a mere two and half minutes, the band has transported us to a realm with different gravity, leaving us adrift in the nebula of cosmic dust.
Much like their protagonist, Motherhood is untethered to any generic constraints or rote song structures. Songs like “Wandering” and “Propeller” are inviting and buoyant, with a cockeyed pop sensibility elevated by Penny Stevens’ charming voice and eerie keys. Others lean towards a proggy, bluesy vein, such the descent into a black hole on “Sunk” or “Flood II,” where Crain’s distinctively crunchy octave fuzz guitar sounds like a circuit-bent version of a Canned Heat song. Even more out of left field is “Grow High,” which uses Balkan rhythms to create a bizarro Beach Boys song that captures the feeling of floating and dissolving into space. Drummer Adam Sipkema's blend of hardcore chops and tasteful percussion holds the band together against wayward gravitational pulls. No Motherhood song is ever one thing: the band revels in amorphousness without ever devolving into self-indulgence. You may be thrown for a loop by a tempo change or unsettling timbre, but you can be confident it’s the right move for the song.
The band uses vocals as a sonic element, whether it be Crain’s and Stevens’ lofty harmonies or the former’s throaty growl. At times, the main vocals are reverb-soaked to the point of obscurity, which threatens to give the wrong impression that Motherhood is doing a kind of Osees/King Gizzard “whoo-whoo” couplets thing. But if you listen closer, you’ll hear that Crain has mastered the art of the slant rhyme through his whip-smart lyrics. To laymen, a line like “I'm hunting/I'm eating what becomes me/I'm breathing in the pungent mist that's heaving just above me” doesn’t have a single rhyme, but to Crain it’s basically Dr. Seuss. The album circles back again and again to concrete imagery (cosmic mist, mud, the Black Cloud) as the protagonist flirts with gnostic revelation. The album’s retrograde motion through allegory is compelling and ends on an ambiguous but uplifting note, like a psychonaut Dorothy returning to Oz.
Like any good concept album, you can listen to Thunder Perfect Mind as a whole unit or for its individual songs. Either way, you’re treated to music that embraces its own artiness and intelligence without losing sight of the playful and pulsating power of punk. Motherhood remains a welcome, alien presence in today’s musical landscape.