Description
Label Review.
2017 album.
Our Overview.
New Zealand-based singer-guitarist Kane Strang's songs have a way of making modest acts seem heroic. At his best, he comes off like Panda Bear doing a one-man garage-band remount of Pixies slow jams. He shares both acts' penchant for twisting innocent sing-alongs into bizarro meditations. Kane Strang’s self-released debut album ‘Blue Cheese’ was so ambitious and polished, it was sort of amazing that he managed to record the whole thing in his bedroom.
Now with a winning blend of careful precision and mercurial abandon, Kane Strang’s new album ‘Two Hearts And No Brain’ is constantly surprising. With a penchant for melodic earworms to rival those of the world’s best pop songwriters, the New Zealand artist’s glittering hooks twist and turn in perfect synch with meticulous band arrangements.
There are hints of 60s pop (Zombies, Stooges) and early 00s alt-rock (Interpol, Elliott Smith) shine through but there’s a contemporary crunch, sheen and bald lyrical tone to Strang’s sound that places him firmly in the here and now. ‘Two Hearts And No Brain’ proves emotive and playfully laced with a tongue-in-cheek nostalgia - timelessly old and new in the same breath.
Hailed as “the next Stephen Malkmus” by The Revue, Strang’s on the brink of becoming indie rock’s intelligent poster boy.