-The Perth quartet Psychedelic Porn Crumpets, originally the solo university project of frontman Jack McEwan, was conceived in a tin shed on the outskirts of the city in 2015. It soon turned too wild for the makeshift studio and escaped into the world as the first LP, High Visceral Part One, in 2016. Finished with the new band’s line up, adding guitarist Luke Parish, Danny Caddy on drums, and Luke Reynolds on bass.
Chasing that release into the aether from the tin shed, 2017’s High Visceral Part Two continued the budding growth of Psychedelic Porn Crumpets’ success. Now it’s 2019, several tours on both sides of the Greenwich Mean Time line through Europe and the US has led us to this album.
And Now For The Whatchamacallit is based, according to McEwan, on the concept of going through an old carnival. This germinating idea was then sent on a whirlwind trip round the tour circuit, which is nothing if not carnivalesque. Any extended trip has a feeling of unreality to it and instead of classifying Psychedelic Porn Crumpets as simply psychedelic, trippy, or pacey stoner rock, it's very easy to identify them as denizens of the unreal world of sanity-eating, carnival touring.
From the opening of lead track Keen for Kick Ons, it sounds like this was being played to you through a clown’s klaxon. The instruments fuzz around the edges and the doubled vocals sound like they're arriving in your brain via the mushrooms on the front cover. The lead single, Bill’s Mandolin, starts with a riff that sounds like it was written for a horn section, yet, strangely, also made for being played through an electrified guitar as well. Skipping forward towards the end of the album is the instrumental Digital Hunger, a short jam built around a simple melodic progression passed around the lead instruments like free jazz.
Music might be a subjective experience, but subjecting yourself to this experimental carnival is worth the admission price, even if that turns out to be a little of your own sanity. Not every psych band can make you really believe they belong in the deranged worlds they create; for Psychedelic Porn Crumpets that is not an issue.
- Simon Perry.