It’s been six years since Patois Counselors came out of the gate with Proper Release, an all-timer of a post-punk album that balanced furious energy with flights of surprising lyricism, a single-minded, oddball perspective with large ensemble arrangements.
The follow-up three years later was the Optimal Seat, a quieter but still menacing outing that got me thinking about the twin titans of the post-punk genre. My Dusted review ended with this: “I’ve slipped in a Fall reference already, but the real touchtone is Pere Ubu, whose bass-y, post-apocalyptic funk set the template and who also got quieter and weirder as time went on. If Proper Release was this band’s Modern Dance, then the Optimal Seat is its Song of the Bailing Man. Who knows what the next one will be?” A live album kept the seat warm earlier this year, and now Bo White tackles the question; what’s next is seething, writhing intelligence, wrapped in softer textures and melodies, but still bracing.
Four songs make a return appearance after the live Enough: One Night at the Daisy Chain. None has changed significantly since then, though the live versions are, across the board, a bit noisier and rougher, while the studio takes allow for more carefully separated, cleaner sound. For instance, “Ranking Set,” a highlight in both albums, is a surging, pummeling rush on Enough. It’s not quite “qualified noise on a tiny speaker” as the lyrics insist, but there is a certain amount of compression. The studio take has the same sense of headlong energy, but you can hear more, the bass for one thing, a saxophone squeal, a sharp but irregular scratch of lead guitar. Likewise, “Serious Rider” pulses with ominous propulsion in both iterations, but the live one brings up the patter of syncopated snare and lets you hear an oscillating clarinet.
Other tracks break more conclusively with past efforts. “Cathy Music” floats and shimmers and twinkles with electronic elements; the thump and hammer of post-punk disappears almost entirely under dream-state atmospherics. “Return to Sensitivity” also shrouds beats in silky swathes of synthesizer. It might remind you of Moon Duo’s Stars of the Light. “Marge Attack” slouches and grooves in trippy dissatisfaction, trailing bloopy bass notes and a wandering clarinet.
And yet, Limited Sphere remains very much in Patois Counselor’s orbit, extending the palette, clarifying the details and continuing the journey. If you love a band, you’ve got to let them try something new.
