Review: Black Moth Super Rainbow candy coat horror on ‘Panic Blooms’

Black Moth Super Rainbow | Panic Blooms | Rad Cult 

Release date: May 4th 2018

Review by Jenna Dreisenstock

A honeyed simmer in the deathly wilt; bubble-pop electronic pollen, stunning on sticky fingertips and cry of razor blades in a caramel apple. A lush, flow of saccharine blood in the poisoned candy glow, blinding in the summery dreamscape of playful synth; the naive of kidnapped childlike curiosity; glittering in a butterfly molasses of a raw, panicked astral body. A searing pain in the crumbling crush of a loving cradle, a sultry chocolate drip through newborn hands in the beauty of abject-horror; a kaleidoscopic terror in shimmering new eyes; sparkling, each breath in, panic attack ventilation; and the swirling, codeine icing – the choking exhalation of tapioca expression. 

The blissful absurdity within a toxic chemical sweetener: pop-candy milkshake pulsing as blood within the veins – lungs stuffed with sponge cake; unable to breathe in suffocating kindness. Dissociation in a dream, a lullaby cradling the phantasmal being; floating, drinking greedily in a chocolate river as spectral hands reach out, struggle, beg in sticky fingertips for help. In their first LP in six years, the stinging saccharine of electronic group Black Moth Super Rainbow spills dream-like in Panic Blooms; the cry of experimental dream-pop bakes in sincerity; a juxtaposition within a lo-fi loving sweetness, shimmering in colourful brilliance – yet deadly to the touch, panicked in the heaviness of worldly turmoil shaped in the softness of a never-ending dream. Exposing himself like a raw, glittering wound: frontman TOBACCO (otherwise known by what’s been described as his “government name”, Tom Fec.) though inherently mysterious in nature, has torn open human vulnerability in his lyrics in Panic Blooms, the delicacy of instability and frailty to be swallowed like candy-coated nails: rusted in facade, pills of dreamy electronic timbre and shoegaze haze mushrooming ecstasy within a beautifully nightmarish reality.

The title track of the album, ‘Panic Blooms‘ sprouts twilight in vivid modulation, the charming flourish of an ice-cream tone; scooped, fingertips cut in a sharp sugar cone shoegaze glaze, struck gleaming guitars – the fluctuation of polyphony cradles the blood-playful yet steady; a syrupy experiment in stinging sunburn. The singing of a steady bass-line as the sustain // release sweetener hovers; a hazey, nurture of the foreboding lightness of colour // the dark and radiant dichotomy seeped in lo-fi percussive. Amongst the shimmering, crying yellows and pinks in visual waveform, TOBACCO’s vocals lure us into a vivid melancholia:

“…Your mouth is bleeding out
From a razor blade in a tangerine…”

The sunken shroud; a misted sickness – a melodic minor synth, caress of the haunting love of vocal reflection. A playground of timbre, synth indulge in frequency and mood. A sadness one can dance to with closed eyes and a delicate heart.

“Feel like the lilacs grow, feel the panic blooms,
I feel you hauntin’ me every other year on my birthday.
It’s like bein trapped in a fog,
You can be yourself but don’t breathe the fumes”

‘Bad Fuckin’ Times‘ opens in gliding oscillation, the rise and fall of bronze in candy floss lungs; greeted by the heaviness of an underworld spectre, the deep processed vocals weigh molasses, the veins of electronic companionship in traverse. TOBACCOs’ sugary lyrics wax and wane in a raw maple wound:

“Had another day that I fell apart,
But that was yesterday, that was yesterday.
And I can only feel it when the sun goes down,
But it’s always down, it’s always down…
You’re even better than depression.”

The glache avant-pop siren song dreams in an echo, an auto-tune-esque cherry-pop voice in an amicable lament; a manic fall in the fluctuation of melody. Driven in a muffled percussive beat, watching shadows on the walls of your childhood bedroom.

‘New Breeze‘ seeps psychedelia in an animated synth sway, lightness in harmonies as an introduction to the soulful low of TOBACCO’s vocals. A steady 4/4 percussive clap trapped in layered amber, swims forward in dreamy synth-pop waves to a celestial harshness; the buzz of candy-cane space ships flutter between exploding stars, a melody sleepily howls, a tone reminiscent of heartbreak post-rock. White noise embrace in space-age glaze; candy-coated sob in a  chocolate bar.

‘Bottomless Face‘ shines in metallic; extraterrestrial in being, an earthy voice speaking, yet tremolo in artificial intelligence – grasping freshly picked flowers and the trigger of a gun.

“It’s such a beautiful day… oh I’m feelin negative,
Can’t wish the damage away… oh I’m feelin negative,
Me and my bottomless face.”

An empty space and white walls tainted with the hand-picked pink of strawberry blood, space age milkshakes in black-hole impulse. Then childlike curiosity in sound and electronic soundscape plays jovial on the concrete, cracked and blooming in auditory experiments.

An ever-so-gently distorted, twinkling arpeggiated melody introduces ‘We Might Come Back‘ following the lush growth of a flowering heartbeat; looped and layered in the oscillated, honeyed cry of caked anxiety amongst the repeating opening melody of glittering stars; colliding and collapsing, dying beautifully in radiant colour. The bind of inquisitive bass in being – swallows, an eclectic whirring scratch and break. Exploring the stretch of high soaring, rocky mountain scape in the anxious yet driven, changing pitch – allows a soulful heaviness in tired footsteps, toward the “DO NOT ENTER”, crying, as you enter.

Each track on Panic Blooms lives within the titles’ ribcage: an anxious beating, of the happily suffering heart. Sickly sweet in saccharine dreams; sugar clogging the lungs in stunning suffocation. A manic creation and destruction of juxtaposition in caress; raw and wounded in a marble mixing bowl. A cut on the tongue spilled the blood of gummy bears – our beings blended and torn, a whipped swirling meringue of nightmare in love and nostalgia. Black Moth Super Rainbow delve within a vulnerable, frosted melancholia topped in bubble-gum; the tender pastel of pinks and blues growing a psychedelic dreamscape. Moonflowers singing in introspective bloom, the loveliest reflections of reality in nightmares; poison so succulent it sprouts within our tender stomachs.

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