Pneuma - Mugwump (Subfield/K7!)

 

Title: Pneuma

Artist: Mugwump

Label: Subfield/K7!

Cat Number: SF020

Genre: Dark Chug

1: A Priori

2: Bewilder Me (Extended)

3: Breakout (Extended)

4: Kaleidescopin (Extended)

5: Cleverest (Extended)

6: Informer Headlock

7: I Don’t Understand You (Instrumental)

8: Man Walks Off Earth (Extended)

9: Locomotive (Extended)

10: Mugwump vs Ceeys Brueder

11: Bewilder Me (Extended Instrudub)

12: Breakout (Extended Instrudub)

13: Cleverest (Extended Instrudub)

One thing that listening to this album from start to finish has taught me is that I can listen to  a deadpan vocal delivery over and over without getting fed up. Those vocals, coming courtesy of Mugwump, serve to crystallise an ambience of omnipresent sleaze. The only track that Swingout Sister became known for, ‘Breakout’, sees action as a single form this collection and, in the process, is transformed from a summery, optimistic anthem to a dark, dank, heads down stomp into the dark realms of uncertainty and doom. And that’s what’s irresistible about this whole album. Insistent melancholia and its associated gravitas is lifted from the void in order to facilitate dancing and losing onseself to the moment. The vocals do take a sideways step occasionally, as on ‘Cleverest’; and don’t feature at all on the fastest paced track here, ‘Informer Headlock’, and the one track which you could imagine being played as the sun comes up, ‘Mugwump vs Ceeys Brueder’. They are at their remorseless best, however, on tracks like ‘ Kaleidescopin’ which for me distils the essence of this work down to a concentrated sound bomb. It’s no surprise at all that the late Mr Weatherall used to play Mugwump’s tracks all the time, and they continue to get exposure at the club nights he was heavily involved with like ‘A Love From Out Of Space’.  When the sonic stars align, as they also do on ‘A Priori’ and ‘Bewilder Me’  the chug is strong, shapes will be thrown and discs will be slipped. And that’s really all that matters.