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Nov 25, 2013 Issue #48 - November/December 2013 - HAIM By JR Moores

Some bands sweat away in the studio for four years perfecting their high-hat sound. Others take a long rest before reassembling to swiftly bash out an album in somebody’s soggy basement. Magik Markers sit firmly in the latter category (or at least sound like it), and if slickness is your bag they’re not for you.

Magik Markers’ follow-up to 2009’s Balf Quarry is so rough at times, its production so jarringly imbalanced, that you’d think Drag City had released their preparatory demo sketches by mistake. The total scuzziness takes some getting used to, which might be why the strongest material is saved for the second half.

Here, the cockeyed blues, snotty punk, and fragile-but-perfunctory folk of the early tracks is superseded by Kraut-tinged, guitar-shredded poetry, a warped ballad, ambient droning, woozy shoegaze, and a duet between two freaky oddballs backed by atonal industrial noodling. Magik Markers 2013: diversifying without compromising. (www.dragcity.com/artists/magik-markers)

Author rating: 6.5/10