Wand
Laughing Matter

Last June marked, quietly and in truth, the twentieth anniversary of the launch of Napster, a file-sharing program that revolutionized the music world and especially cornered (and emptied the wallets of) nearly all record companies.

While we thought that finally grassroots music would conquer chart music, in the end, it was more the small bands than the established artists who lost out. With the fragmentation of the physical medium (yes, okay, the return of vinyl, but go check the sales data from AD 1999, do the math and blanch), much less money circulates around music. Apart from a few all-encompassing stars, the rest barely make a living. So, just to make ends meet, what must a musician do? Record albums and go on tour. A productive bulimia that takes root almost everywhere, but in California over the last 15 years seems to have greater effects than in other places.

The Wand (associated with Ty Segall, speaking of productive bulimia), well represent this trend: they are on their fifth album in five years. I've often railed against this hyperproductivity because I believe that overexposure has the same effect as underexposure; but the Wand, luckily/skillfully, manage the impossible feat of improving over time. “Laughing Matter” follows the beautiful “Plum” from 2 years ago. Now they raise the stakes further, with a courageous 70-minute album, a versatile example of '10s psychedelia, among Flaming Lips, early Mercury Rev, Radiohead, mid-'90s Motorpsycho, vintage krautrock, and plenty of personality, which of course doesn't hurt.

The opening duo would be enough to justify the ticket price: “Scarecrow” proceeds slyly and dreamily, a lopsided architecture supported by piano and metronomic drums; “xoxo” seems as if it has come out of “Ege Bamyasi” by Can, until the Motorpsycho guitars from “Angels & Demons At Play” break in, mixed with the wild trumpets of Mercury Rev.

Followed by fat and acid hard-punk riffs (“Walkie Talkie”), electric rides crossed with dissonant synths (“Lucky's Sight”), pop songs between Deus and pre-“Ok Computer” Radiohead (“Rio Grande”), hypnotic arpeggios without beginning or end, shaken by uncontrolled surges of electricity (“Thin Air”), again the Motorpsycho of “Trust Us” but with a more melodic approach and an unforgettable refrain (“Wonder”), unexpected folk oases (“High Planes Drifter”). They even allow themselves 9 minutes of soft post rock psychedelia, with an unexploded crescendo, in “Airplane”.

An album that closes with a Velvet period self-titled apocryphal (“Jennifer's Gone”) that certifies the versatility of leader Corey Hanson, as well as the growing musical talent.

In my personal top 3 of the year.