Album Review: Musostics by Junior Electronics

As on Junior Electronics' self-titled debut, Musostics makes Joe Watson's connections to Stereolab and High Llamas clear (Watson has played with and/or mixed and engineered works by both groups). Watson's fondness for mischievous yet elegant melodies and arrangements echoes those bands, and an aloof playfulness is something all three acts share. However, on Musostics Junior Electronics gets even more cerebral and high-concept than Watson's contemporaries: these songs are inspired by mesostics, a form of typographical play where a line of intersecting vertical text relating to the body text is created by placing words carefully.

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THEESatisfaction Seattle has become a bastion of oddball hip-hop thanks to Shabazz Palaces and its sometime collaborator, THEESatisfaction: the duo of Stasia Irons and Catherine Harris-White. They rap, sing and produce their own tracks on “Awe Naturale” (Sub Pop), which follows material they ….

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Apparently nobody hangs around the likes of Stereolab and the High Llamas without sharing a similar musical philosophy, and that's very much the case with Junior Electronics. It turns out that Joe Watson has played with both of the aforementioned bands and as a result, Musostics has that retro, easy-listening quality that's instantly familiar. Unfortunately, it just isn't that memorable.

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