(Nervous Jerks)

Gooey sticky good stuff otherwise known as calypso!

Sly Hats is Geoff O’Conner’s solo outing after writing and singing for Melbourne’s Crayon Fields. Being obsessed with any Hawaiian or surf record I come across for under a dollar in a thrift shop, as well as offbeat lyrics sung by cute bespectacled popsters, I’m hooked. Echo-y percussion holds its own under O’Conner’s chalky, balmy voice. Delicious calypso balladry is backed up by dreamy retrospective harmonies and the cleverly layered pop is tight. Musical cameos add to the overall quirkiness. A distant acoustic or electric guitar makes its way to the forefront of the percussive sound sandwich every now and then like a reality check, only to be lost under calypso soulfulness again. Don’t miss track 10 Kill The Lights. Rhythmically it’s a skip through a field of gently swaying wheat and the pinch of the vocals at the end of each phrase sees it magically to its early demise.

ILI TULLOCH

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