Picastro's debut album, Red Your Blues, was an
intriguing variation on alternative singer/songwriter
themes, presenting Liz Hysen's songs in a deliberately
vague context of shifting, swirling soundtracks,
tinged with blue melancholia. Drifting somewhere
between Hysen the singer and Picastro the band, these
were lost songs, murmurs and echoes, whose very
imprecision seemed to make them all the more precious.
The follow-up, Metal Cares, is largely more of the
same. The sound is familiar from the debut, with a
gradual build-up of fluid rhythms, dominated by
acoustic guitar and cello but reinforced by tough
percussion, mixed loud. But there's also more of an
unevenness present, with the bare-wired twang of
guitars and Hysen's voice more obviously exposed,
standing out in relief from the music’s meandering ebb
and flow.
In some ways the impression is similar to that left by
Mark Lanegan's earlier solo work — a sort of lingering
sense of unease and sadness, with the voice drifting
between murmur and exhortation as the songs wrap
themselves around the singer in winding, circular
patterns. This raw abstraction is typified by songs
such as "No Contest," "Sharks" and "Blonde Fires," in
which Hysen merges with the group identity so that her
voice is integral to the sound but doesn't appear to
be leading it. "Teeth and No Eyes" and "Drama Man" are
more starkly arranged, while "I Fall Asleep" finds
Hysen adopting an eerie falsetto voice and drifting,
noisily, into PJ Harvey territory. "Skinnies," a
collaboration with Dwayne Sodahberk, combines
plaintive singing with discordant electronica, and is
the best example here of the band stretching beyond
its boundaries, with perhaps the promise of future
forays outside the comfort zone.
Metal Cares is largely a worthy follow up to
Picastro's first album, but in its faithful execution
of what has become a recognizable style it also
demonstrates that there's only so much mileage in this
approach, and that they'll need to offer more variation
if they want to avoid sounding too formulaic in
future.
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