Braindrops

Description

"I invented fake news as a genre of music," Gareth Liddiard observes with a laugh. He's talking about "Maria 63," the last track on the LP "Braindrops," Tropical Fuck Storm's second album. The song addresses the once perfectly fringe and formerly marginalized conspiracy theories, which now seem to be the engine driving the rise of fascism in global politics. "It's a Mossad agent who went to Buenos Aires to assassinate Maria Orsic, a Nazi witch who telepathically obtained plans from aliens for chain drive engines," Liddiard recounts. "It might be the dumbest song ever written," Liddiard jokes. He's mistaken, "Maria 63" is emblematic of Tropical Fuck Storm's ability to mine the extreme fringes of pop culture for powerful musical and conceptual spice. "Braindrops" overflows with compelling sounds and visions that reflect the often bleak and fractured reality of life on planet Earth as we hurtle towards environmental and social decline at a frighteningly rapid pace. Tropical Fuck Storm were formed around 2017 in the city of Melbourne, Victoria, along the southeastern coast of Australia. The band released their debut album "A Laughing Death in Meatspace" on Joyful Noise Recordings in 2018. Each of the 4 band members brings considerable experience to the group. Liddiard and Fiona Kitschin were part of 'The Drones,' a long-running and critically acclaimed band, while Erica Dunn and Lauren Hammel have played in various rather well-received projects. It's perhaps this rich rock and roll experience that allows 'Tropical Fuck Storm' to deconstruct and distort genre norms with such excellence. "Everything we do, we try to do it in a strange way. The whole album is full of weird beats and bizarre shit everywhere," explains Liddiard. He cites Doc in Beefheart, Captain of the radar station era, as an essential sonic touchstone. Braindrops certainly shares the Captain's penchant for hammering abstract grooves. Tropical Fuck Storm achieved a particularly off-kilter sound on Braindrops. Liddiard attributes this in part to the band's use of unconventional equipment: "We use a lot of techno gear to make rock and roll, because the latter is boring and sounds like Led Zeppelin." Liddiard's own description of Tropical Fuck Storm's sound is almost as interesting and evocative as the music itself. He describes the album's title as "Fela Kuti in a car crash" and talks about creating a sonic atmosphere that "smells like chloroform" for "Maria 62." Liddiard can be a little more taciturn when asked to specify the band's lyrical themes. "It's not always a good idea to be too direct." Liddiard prefers a "more nebulous and mysterious" approach instead. A recurring theme on Braindrops concerns the different ways the human brain can be manipulated and controlled for exploitative purposes. "The Planet of Straw Men" is a study of human behavior in social media comment sections, a place where reasonable people can be seen happily indulging in psychotic rhetoric. While Liddiard is careful not to say too much about the band's lyrics, he is confident that the audience will find its own meaning. "If you show 'Hamlet' to a gorilla, even if it's able to read it, it won't be able to see itself inside. But with humans, that's kind of what we do. We have our heads up our asses." Listening to Braindrops is a disturbing and exhilarating experience, full of thrilling grooves, dark humor, dissonant experimentation, and unsettling intrigue. Braindrops is an relentless work from an relentless musical ensemble. "Tropical Fuck Storm is its own thing," Liddiard offers. "Everything we do, we do until death."