Tracklist:

1. Ra in the Rising
2. Florida Silver Springs
3. The Working Vessel
4. Pixie Pride
5. Fulgent Fields
6. Tahuti, Splendid Scribe
7. Late Summer Sky
8. Kephra
9. Hornbeam
10. Pan-ther
11. Wild West Wake Us Up
12. Hathor
13. Our Love Lives
14. Twisted Sol Epoch
15. Willow Willow Yew
16. Little Gloves
17. Tum

Recorded in just two weeks, the Impossible Shapes’ Tum was originally released early last year on limited edition vinyl (limited to 300 in fact) just before the release of their proper fifth album Horus. While not necessarily a companion piece to Horus, Tum has been dubbed the “younger sister” to that album. Fortunately rather than becoming lost forever and talked about as that “very rare Impossible Shapes vinyl” it’s being re-released on compact disc. Of course, for some of us who don’t buy vinyl, the whole release was offered for free download on Secretly Canadian’s website for a short time early last year.

Whereas Horus had a decidedly darker tone than the usual upbeat pop that the Impossible Shapes crank out on a regular basis Tum feels like a re-blooming of sorts, if a rough one…ignoring the fact that it was released just before Horus of course.

Tum’s 17 tracks span only 31 minutes and seven of them are instrumental numbers. Some of these instrumentals are incredibly rough lo-fi recordings (“Wild West Wake Us Up”) while others a bizarre psychedelic shifts in sound (“Hathor”). While not for picking and choosing, when listened to as a whole the record’s snippets and more fully realized tracks fit together perfectly.

At its most fully realized, Tum is Impossible Shapes at its most desirable. Tracks like “Pixie Pride” and “Pan-ther” are golden pop nuggets. Songs like these are reason enough to wake up in the morning, or at the very least enough to make someone smile for a few minutes.

The Impossible Shapes have received their fair share of comparisons to other bands throughout their career, most of which are incredibly overblown and overused, so they won’t be repeated here. These comparisons seem to make more sense, when speaking of Tum, however, than ever before.

Judging by the recording quality and loose, fragmented feel of the record, it was probably initially supposed to remain fairly hidden as a vinyl-only release. Lucky for the listener this didn’t happen and what we get is a record full of glorious psychedelic influenced pop gems.

While the Impossible Shapes have been doing this for several years now, Tum feels like a breath of fresh air. Not so much in relation to the band’s own discography, but in relation to today’s current musical landscape—or at the very least, my musical landscape. Be thankful for bands like the Impossible Shapes—smile and enjoy.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 8th, 2006 at 10:00 am and is filed under Record Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. Edit this entry.