In case you are wondering why I have posted 'Something to Drink 4' instead of 2 as I promised in my last post the reason is simple. If you have downloaded s.t.d. 3 and 4 then you have all the songs which appeared in number 2, so there is no real point in sharing it. And in case you are wondering what happened to Something to Drink 1 the answer is there never was one. It was a private release distributed only among some close friends.
The sound of Division S is an eclectic melange of retro styles, involving everything from camp 30s dance and film music through doo-wop and noir jazz to 60s bubblegum pop and psychedelia. They have elements in common with the ‘industrial nostalgia’ of Horologium, and they share a certain louche, Latin, sleazy-listening sensibility with such artists as Ô Paradis, Novy Svet and Spiritual Front, but really, Division S aren’t quite like anyone else. If you enjoy Serge Gainsbourg, Bain Wolfkind’s solo work, or the Spell album by Boyd Rice and Rose McDowall, then it’s likely that your tolerance for irony and campness is sufficiently well developed to appreciate the aesthetic pose of Division S.
Something To Drink 4 involves a lot of cocktail-lounge jazz – the plucked double bass and cymbal work of ‘Ill’ Ego’, accompanying a lugubrious Nick Cave-like vocal (it also sounds something like the stuff Sol Invictus have been producing lately); the brushed drums of ‘Lonely Day’; the tinkling electric piano and soft brass of ‘Seven’ (which is, rather counter-intuitively, the eighth song); the vibraphone and walking bossa nova bass line of the loungecore instrumental ‘Soft Morning’ (this song could easily pass for Stereolab). But there are many other musical modes in evidence here – the shoegazing, ethereal pop, spaced out over dry snare-drum rolls, of ‘Sweet Fly’, the dementedly looped orchestral strings of ‘Lament For The Blind’, the rockabilly rimshots, bottleneck guitar and remote, muffled vocals of ‘Lying Charge’, the last-dance-of-the-night millennial psychedelia of ‘Trippin’’, but for me, the real highpoint of the album is to be found in the strung-out, stripped-back drawl and flanged guitar of ‘So Real Illusions’. It’s at this point that not even knowing the name of the vocalist gets a bit frustrating – this guy is really good. All the songs on Something To Drink 4 are originals, with the exception of ‘Another Time’ which is a cover of Pearls Before Swine song – a soft, Byrds-like pop song featuring acoustic guitar and female backing vocals. Something To Drink 4 manages to pack an awful lot into its 44 minutes duration. Compared to its predecessor – yes, it’s called Something To Drink 3 – this album seems to make greater use of rock and pop styles, rather than the nostalgic relics of earlier epochs, but Division S are nothing if not idiosyncratic and unpredictable.
This latest excursion into the sardonic, bloodshot-eyed world of Division S is available in a limited edition of 300 copies, in a jewel case with an insert containing very little information beyond the track titles.
Tracklist
01 A' Chanter
02 Another Time
03 Ill' Ego
04 Lament For The Blind
05 Lonely Day
06 Lying Charge
07 Routine Break
08 Seven
09 So Real Illusions
10 Soft Morning
11 Still Waiting
12 Sweet Fly
13 Trippin'
Download here:
http://www.mediafire.com/?gpy9t4lqa5xrmyj
