volcano!

I'd be surprised if you like the new single from Chicago's volcano! (the exclamation mark is very intentional) on first listen. There's just so much to process; do you focus on the lyrics (denouncing the misguided nature of some of the self-aggrandizing popstars involved in Live Aid and similar campaigns), the guitar melody that jumps jerkily around like it's got an itch it can't scratch or follow the drum and basslines that sound as if they're refugees from a free-jazz record but forced to do battle in the confines of a structured song? The human brain isn't designed to handle all this in one go.

BUT! there'll be that niggling feeling in the back of your head that this song really has something that you can't place your finger on, something you want to hear more of. You'll listen again, again and again, it will all make glorious sense and you'll realise that Africa Just Wants To Have Fun is one of the best songs from 2008.

At it's heart, it's really a pop song - just flattened, stretched, remorphed, scrambled and smashed into a form that makes complete sense to volcano! and will blow the mind of any innocent passerbys. This is a good thing.

Like the Dirty Projectors and Deerhoof's brand of angular avant-indie? Africa Just Wants To Have Fun couldn't be more up your street.

Download: volcano! - Africa Just Wants To Have Fun (MP3)

Any song that can invent the frankly brilliant word "Philantharopicacool" gets the thumbs up from me.

You can buy the single direct from Leaf here and their second album, Paperwork is due on the 1st September in the UK (16th for those on the other side of the Atlantic).
If the opening single Africa... is anything to go by, it'll be more "accessible" but just as forward looking and unique as their highly-rated debut Beautiful Seizure.