Slip on your headphones, my dears, sit tight… and now we enter hyper-space. The journey starts out with the sound of liquid swooshy happy heartbeats on “Born of Light.” Laser guns enter, blazing the way for the galaxy, decked out in its best ’80s night outfit, to strut its stuff against a background of singing. I have no idea what the echoing lyrics are going on about, but this isn’t so bad – War’s voice is just one of what seems like hundreds of effects and experiments, and as a whole, Police Water comes off as dizzyingly instrumental. “On Its Head” again features indecipherable urgent whispering amid a whirling, colourful soundscape built with lashing drums and rapidly squiggling synth. We don’t see any melodies, just a stream of the same glittering ether leaking out into formless forms, layered over at the end of the track with cacophonous chords, what sounds like a plane taking off, and dashes of microphone feedback. As we approach the centre of the EP, things start getting a lot more dancey with a great squeaky interlude on “Grounds for Termination.” And then there’s the heavy, repetitive, exhilarating “Sirens.” This is where our voyage ends if you own the vinyl, but the CD offers two bonus tracks, both of which are, as always, hypnotic, high-energy, and much more accessible than you’d ever imagined from the start. (Sacred Bones Records, www.sacredbonesrecords.com) Adrienne Yeung
Winnipeg music & culture since 1989