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Oneida

Preteen Weaponry

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BY Stuart Berman   August 13, 2008 15:08

Editorial Rating:
ONEIDA PLAY LEE’S PALACE (529 BLOOR W) AUG 15. 

Even taking into account Oneida’s predilection for psychedelic excess and wacked-out concepts, the news that they were slaving away on a triple-album called Thank Your Parents — described by singer/organist Fat Bobby in a 2006 EYE WEEKLY interview as being inspired by how “Francis Bacon organized human knowledge into three branches: imagination, reason and history” — still seemed a touch too ridiculous even by their gonzo standards. But the Brooklyn acid-rockers have held up their end of the bargain, even if they’ve taken the somewhat more reasonable route of breaking up Thank Your Parents into three separate releases, of which Preteen Weaponry is the first.

Hearing it now after over two years of build-up, it’s quite possible the whole Thank Your Parents framework is simply a convenient way to apply a structure onto what are ostensibly amorphous extendo-jams. But taken together, Preteen Weaponry’s three set pieces (average length: 13 minutes each) are complementary enough to approximate the feeling of being slowly lowered into a volcano and then spit out again: the first part pits a sinister Spacemen 3 drone against clattering hailstorm percussion; the spooky, lava-singed second section resembles Black Sabbath’s “Planet Caravan” as played on a sun-melted copy of Paranoid; while the third part breaks the black-cloud bleakness with soothing synth tones and breezy Krautrockin’ momentum.

The next TYP instalment arrives in early ’09, which might not allow enough time to figure out what any of this has to do with your parents, but it should at least grant you the opportunity to restock the munchies.

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