Von
Robinson & His Own Universe | Jostle
It!#¢
Independent
Review by Peter Aaron
The debut EP by Brooklyn-to-Wappingers Falls
transplants Von Robinson & His Own Universe is so deceptively
un-weird that it is, in fact, totally and extremely weird.
The five beyond-unabashed pop tracks on Jostle It!#¢
are smothered with enough sugar to fill the Marshmallow Fluff
factory, but Robinson’s lyrics, pregnant with brainy
and surreal political protest, don’t even begin to register
until the third or fourth spin.
Aurally this is quirky, orchestrated, Farfisa-fueled
bubblegum that pulls from Squeeze, early Elvis Costello, Burt
Bacharach, and the Beach Boys; it makes perfect sense that
the band has a cut on a recent Elephant 6 Recordings compilation,
since that label’s pysch-pop acts (Apples in Stereo,
Neutral Milk Hotel, Olivia Tremor Control) figure heavily
into the sound as well. But the words are another cartoon
animal entirely. The Indiana-bred Robinson claims fellow Hoosier
Kurt Vonnegut as a chief lyrical muse, and even quotes the
late genius in the anti-military/industrial bon-bon mot “Satellites
and Totem Poles.” It takes an oddly subversive pop record
to get one hum-singing along to lines like “We’re
one flipping lovely gang / eating velvet and we /
write it off as business or charity / if we happen
to discuss God or poverty / Beware the moat around
our circle of empathy” (from “Xxxtraordinary
Rendition”).
What is it they say about catching more flies
with sugar than salt? Still not exactly sure why anyone would
want to catch those darn flies, but whatever: Robinson’s
sticky-sweet popaganda lemming trap is a clever one indeed.
And he’s in the studio now building a full-length model
for release this year. www.vonrobinson.com
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