Stone Fish
is the ambitious, complex second full-length from New York-based experimental pop group
Big French
, arriving four years after their 2013 debut,
Downtown Runnin
, as well as a cassette EP. The album almost sounds like the work of an entirely different band than its predecessor. On their first full-length,
played a bizarre blend of bombastic prog rock and knotty post-punk, with most of the album's 18 songs falling under the two-minute mark. While the album was intriguing, it was quite hard to listen to due to songwriter
Quentin Moore
's annoyingly high-pitched, squeaky voice, which fell somewhere in between
Danielson
's
Daniel Smith
,
Perry Farrell
, and
Scharpling & Wurster
's character Timmy von Trimble. Thankfully, he has a more regular vocal range on
, immediately making the album considerably more palatable.
don't rock out on
as much as they did on
; they tone down the heavy guitars and punk tempos and go for more of a jittery, minimalist art rock sound. Surprisingly, this album sounds way more lo-fi than their debut, with the drums generally sounding buried behind smudgy tape effects and scratchy guitars. On the peppy "Words Appear," the group stuffs a multitude of cartoonish noise bursts into little more than a minute.
Moore
's abstract, poetic lyrics retain a childlike quality, describing animals and inanimate objects that can talk, and questioning the presence or existence of things. However, he's more direct and poignant on later tracks like "Second Kid with You" and "My Angel."
Zach Phillips
, who ran the excellent
OSR Tapes
until 2016, plays numerous instruments on the album, and it actually sounds a lot closer to his band
Blanche Blanche Blanche
than previous
recordings, particularly on tracks such as standout "The New Cochlear Sun."
is brimming with ideas, and is easily
's best work to date. ~ Paul Simpson