EL MOMENTO DESCUIDADO

This album was commissioned by a label that does acoustic albums by Aussie rock veterans (members of Weddings parties anything and Hunters and Collectors have also done them). The album is a mixture of old and new tracks by the Sydney-based inventors of neo-psych. The old songs are very interesting, as hits like The Unguarded Moment, Metropolis and Under the Milky Way take on a new subtlety without the band's usual effects-laden electric guitar attack and reveal the band's grasp of songwriting craft. These tracks work beautifully, although if you aren't a fan of the band or of acoustic music, you wouldn't be interested in these versions much. A couple are even improved, such as A New Season, which is much more beautiful in its sparse new version, and Almost With you, which benefits from the lack of pounding early 80s heavily-processed drums. The new songs seem a bit thrown together, though...Til the Cows Come Home and All I Know will have no place in the pantheon of the band's best work, since they sound like Kilbey cobbled some rhymes together on the spot. November is a nice, creepy psych folk type song, however, that wouldn't sound out of place on an early 70s acid recording. Prog fans who may have a hankering to try some Church (and if you like Sigur Ros and other guitar-effects bands, you really should) will not want to start with this, but it's by no means an embarassment or just a straight "hits-unplugged" record.