3 out of 5

Label: self-released

Produced by: Treiops Treyfid

It’s easy to forget that there’s a lot of goodness on this album because of how annoyingly it opens.  Treyfid has a particular monotone, somewhat nasally talk-sing that remains fairly consistent throughout the album, and a vague, peace-out be-green mentality that bubbles up in his lyrics more or less obviously.  The music bounces between a bundle of electro-influenced styles, the most noxious of these being a house beat with a college-rock acoustic strum… which describes opening cuts ‘I Know Who You Are’ and ‘Iceland’s Majestic Violence,’ the latter of which featuring an embarrassingly cluttered narrative that reeks of a coffee house jam.  It’s hard not to pretend like you don’t know how THESE songs got into your mix.  Things get a little better on ‘This Ride’ and the ‘Are You Mine?;’ ‘Ride’ has Treiops exploring his vocals more as a drone element to the track, and the simplified beats are peeled back for some more fuzzy experimentation, which comes even more to the fore in ‘Mine.’  And then you can start to recover from that initial experience.  Some obnoxiousness still pops up in the Spongehead-light rant ‘SSALESS’ and ‘Save the Green,’ but the majority of the rest of ‘Creature’ – which is a fair amount of listening, there being 21 tracks total, with only a couple short instrumental bits – is actually really rewarding stuff, Treyfid stepping into Trans Am territory on ‘We Must Be Together,’ or the various kraut-rock workouts that sprout up, and even a full-on legitimate song like ‘Thank You Points’ wins.  Overall, you’re looking at a low percentage of stinkers, they just happened to be cluttered at the start, when you’re getting a flavor of what you think is to come.  Had those tracks been spread out, they’d be much more tolerable.

Treiops Treyfid is a multi-medium artist; ‘Creature of the Universe’ definitely has the tang of one part of an art installation, but the breadth of his output (and creativity on display when you allow yourself to dig into this disc) makes it clear that this isn’t just a fleeting passion… though some eye-rolling tracks, taken alone, could convince you otherwise.