Pittsburgh City Paper—CD Review

Telefonics - Colour Delux - Methopop Records

Swathed in layer after layer of feedback, immersed in a sweet-psych revisionist Brit-rock history, Telefonics is probably the closest thing to My Bloody Valentine to ever come out of Erie, PA. Beginning about halfway through the eight-song studio section of Colour Delus, when the acid-damaged, Beatles-confused gravity of “Yellow Summer” gives way to the weightless signals of “Hallowed Ground”, this disc leaves its listener scrambling for solid ground. Telefonics is one of those rare guitar groups that can write pure pop songs that still befuddle and bemuse throughout, slipping in and out of tune purposefully, and hitting melodies respectably while keeping in mind that confusion is next.

From the launch, “Silver Plastic Space Bay” disguises what’s ahead. Arranged around a 50’s sci-fi sample---“I’m afraid there is no alternative. In such a case, the planet Earth would have to be---eliminated”---which the song repeats beneath a think bag of controlled feedback and guitar shimmer, and an “Oh yeah, uh-huh” chorus, it’s kind of cheesy chunk of textbook psychedelia, and wholly unlike the combinations of more complex symmetry and confounding sound to come. There are total sonic washes, such as parts of “Yellow Summer” and “Hallowed Ground”, but then there are straight-ahead garage rockers like the live “Gotta Go” and even chart-threatening, radio-friendly pop (“Dead Air” with its uber-catchy “Too hungover/too hungover/to fly-aye-aye-aye” chorus).

This is a leap and a bound ahead for Telefonics. Although at times the band’s attempt to weld together melodies and noise is less congruent than one would hope for, Colour Delux is a fine mess of pop and rock from a group unwilling to stop when it reaches the boundaries its musical neighbors have established.

review by Justin Hopper