3 out of 5

Label: Epicericords

Produced by: ?

A mesmerizing stream of crowded art rock, Lapin’s Latérale Pelouse applies at length the two comparisons I’d previously made: the performative bravado of Yamantaka//Sonic Titan, and the woozy pop of The Luyas. Interestingly, the isolated tracks that made their contribution to the linked split with Chafouin so appealing – tracks that reappear here – are somewhat less grabbing (though not less interesting) in this context, where the music benefits from longer windups; that is: the payoffs are a bit more spread out, and the times between, where the group wrestles with and rustles about various instruments, and vocals, and beats, are a little too stylistically blurry to settle in.

And I know: you can’t win with me: sometimes I’m criticizing for being too much of one genre or another, and here I’m seemingly docking Lapin for making intriguing but hard to define noise, but I think in all cases I’m just looking for a band / artist to keep their eye on the prize of providing music that has a feeling I can follow. “Just” does a lot of heavy lifting there; “feeling” is certainly subjective; however, that’s where terms like “performative” and “art rock” can be especially problematic, as they’re suggestive of style over substance. What’s quirky about Latérale Pelouse is that the band is almost nervously trying to avoid that vibe by continuing to shuffle their pieces around, and periodically – on Banquet, on LAE – they’ll have been dicking around long enough to have the courage to move forward as a group, find a rhythm, and play more directly into it. And they’ll album is absolutely worth those moments. The quirk is also kind of endearing, and makes me wish the band had (or will) deliver some type of followup, either leaning even more into the restlesness and making that their thing, or increasing the ratio of “on” moments a bit more.