Graham Repulski - Over The Shit Rainbow / Universal Tourist - Tape (2013)

Labels: self released
Review by: Oli Saunders

If I had asked someone to write indie music that the vast majority of people go ‘huh?’ to whilst I sit there nodding my head like a madman and wondering why no one gets me then this would be the outcome. On the surface this is a piece of shit right? The first track is a constantly played bass riff with a guy alongside either pitching in now and again on guitar or rambling in the background. It’s not even fucking recorded properly. On the second track the bass goes away and instead the guitar takes over playing pretty much that same riff whilst the rambling continues. Two songs? Fifty copies made of which I have ended up with two? Huh?

Wrong. This is absolutely magnificent. I am sat here listening to the tape over and over and my head’s still nodding. I haven’t worked out what the lyrics are trying to say but I still feel connection with lots of parts and take my own meaning from it. The vocals are perfect, taking on the role of an instrument in semi-Jeff Mangum fashion (whilst sounding nothing like him I should add). The repetitive nature… well the beauty is there in the subtlety of it all, nothing outstays its welcome. My only gripe against Graham Repulski in general is the amount of music he is making and how some of it, including a fair bit of Cop Art last year, doesn’t pass quality control. But songs like the two on this tape easily make up for that; a gem of lo-fi indie.

3rd January 2014