5 out of 5

Label: digital self-release

Produced by: Alan Sinclair

With Discogs / bandcamp releases dating back to the early 2010s, we have here a purported collection of “demos” dating back to before those earliest releases, bundled and sequenced and digitally released as part of a pandemic clearinghouse of sorts by Repeated Viewing, aka Alan Sinclair.

Why am I enclosing demos in quotes, and further calling them out as purported? Because come on, guy, this is a full album of amazing material, that somehow – though definitely pulling from not only the wide range of dates mentioned in its titling, but also differently-themed releases – manages to play together as one of Sinclair’s most seamless and unique sets. (Which is saying a lot: I love this guy, and his faux-horror movie scores are, to me, some of the best in that subgenre, playing to the Romero / Goblin “hits” without coming across as generic, or shtick.)

“Demos” is surprisingly soundscape-driven, kicking off with the atmospheric The Beach House Theme 2 and picking and prodding around a pleasingly upbeat – but, y’know, sneakily sinister – run of tracks, with stopovers in creepy circus sing-songs (the effectively named Evil Circus), some late-night jams (e.g. Piano Creeps On’s badass kickbeat), and the occasional stalker theme, like the psych / sci-fi pings of Hunter. Given Sinclair’s pedigree as a synthwaver, this stuff isn’t off the map, but the focus on it – on a lack of more clearly “retro” style horror beats – is a lot of fun, especially packaged together as demos, which I’d normally expect to be more predictable fare, or scratch beats. Even if we want to frame this as stuff that didn’t fit on albums, hence it being slightly off-brand, I’d underline how well it all syncs together, respecting that Alan must’ve picked through quite a bit of material and undeniably thought through how best to make this a front-to-back listening experience.

Sometimes RV leans into more cinematic scores; sometimes they’re campy; dancy; and so on, with degrees of creepiness adjusted to match. They’re almost always fun, but “Demos” manages to carry with it an almost lightheartedness – perhaps owing to not being tied to a narrative – that shows that Sinclair can pull his magic off, whether or not there’s a fake film to which to map his tunes.