'D is for W' is the new album by London band VILE IMBECILES whose name always grabs my attention when I see it. Even though I still have to see them live, it's the sort of name that gets you wondering what they will sound like. The name of the album apparently dates from the singer's stint working in the call centre of an insurace company and an overheard conversation where a collegue was phonetically spelling something and telling the client "no, D is for W." Well, we've all had conversations where that might me the case.
The opening salvo of this album Rolling In Ice Cream is like sex music for kids who are freaking out on too much Mephedrine. 'Split Your Signature' sounds like they had taken elements of Pigbag and The Contortions and smashed them together with such force that they splinter into this new sound.Apathetic Innocence steals liberally from Rachel Stamp's I've Got The Worm but infuses it with the sort of fractured psychedelia you'd expect from the Holloys. There are plenty of backwards guitars and off kilter noises flailing around in there.
Playing In The park has some dark, tortured lyrics over some discordant sounds, but the more the album goes on, the more schizophrenic and disjointed it sounds while at the same time managing to cohere into this off-beat not-quite-jazz band. It reminds me of the way that, say, Led Bib can be both a great live hard jazz band that are almost punks except that Vile Imbeciles go the other way by being a punky indie band that are at times almost funk Jazz. Yes, that's funk jazz rather than Jazz Funk. An important distinction to make.
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The denouement is Weird Cos Your Real. It winds down with a repetitive ending that works beautifully as a fade out. Vile Imbeciles certainly make no effort to fit into any obvious pigeonholes and that can only be to their advantage in standing out from the crowd even if it makes it harder work getting into the music for the uninitiated. I think a few more intensive listens will convince me it's well worth the effort, however.
Vile Imbeciles online
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