Clipd Beaks – Lost Offerings EP
The reward for dwelling in obscurity is, of course, the thrill of unearthing a real gem. Oakland five-piece Clipd Beaks have been honing their fractured psyche-noise nightmare for a decade now, but they’re new to these ears all the same, while their latest EP, Lost Offerings , is a spectacular exercise in paranoid, post-hardcore inflections.
Clipd Beaks are patient, quiet-loud-quiet specialists, their four cuts drifting between dream and up-front assault, the intimate recording quality giving the EP live-like intensity. Tense guitar distortion and pained vocals splash across uncomfortable drone. Apocalyptic mid-tempo swell creeps around the mix eroding initial ideas of ambient melody and/or gentle psychedelia.
Lost Offerings ‘ highlight however is its opener, “Womb To Tomb”, a black noise-rock crunch bound to get Steve Albini hot under the collar with the positioning of its mics more than reminiscent of his greatest anti-social statements. Lest we forget it was Albini himself who said that “Making punk records is definitely a case where more “work” does not imply a better result”. Lost Offerings isn’t strictly a punk record, but Clipd Beaks have nevertheless nailed the level of effort it took to commit it to tape.
~The Lost Offerings cassette is our now on Moon Glyph .~