Cassette Review: whathappenedonthatisland "find a nice place to sit and die"

[£4 // Edition of 25 // https://whathappenedonthatisland.bandcamp.com/album/find-a-nice-place-to-sit-and-die]

The first thing you need to know about this cassette is that the package it came in was rather large.    You may or may not be able to tell this based upon the photos, but there was a bubble mailer followed by a box followed by wrapping paper.   Oddly enough, this played host to only one cassette though it could have quite possibly have held maybe twenty cassettes or more.    So, yes, when I got this in the mail I was rather worried because getting that much music in the mail at once can be a bit overwhelming for me.   (Though I am not saying it is bad because if you want to send me a hundred cassettes at once then do it up!  I will review them all without complaint)

This cassette, called "find a nice place to sit and die", begins quietly with piano bliss.    It is ambient and at first there are Pong tones.   As much as I can hear them in that particular video game, I also can't help but think that maybe it is some sort of pattern, somehow sending signals off of the island and requesting help be sent.    Obviously this artist name on the whole just reminds me of the television series "Lost".

There are distant background screams buried into the beginning and then it becomes lo-fi bliss pop rock with a drum machine and, yes, I realize I just used the word "bliss" twice in about as many songs so that should help you with the overall vibe these sounds put out.    There are electronic clicks and then rapid fire drum machine beats ala Aloha.    Passionate screams come through electronic loops.

Next the sound of the Cure somehow comes out and there is live drumming.    It's pretty, like an acoustic Radiohead song, and yet it also has the melodies of 311.    Vocals become meshed into everything else and this is just all about the percussion.    Somewhere between pinball and R2D2 takes us through clanking drums, which find it instrumental as it has had vocals almost throughout up until now.

When the vocals return it reminds me of something between Gatsbys American Dream and Illegal Wiretaps as there is a drum machine and it can be dreamy but also come back around as screamy as well.    Somehow, this picks up into synthwave and then I hear some Animal Flag.    The rhythm then comes through as some cross of being stuck on an island (like that one song Weezer had about being on an island or perhaps some sort of Hawaiian music) and something much more simplistic like elevator music.    This all ends with him saying something that sounds like "I love you like a brother" but is not.

So for being stuck on an island or wondering what did happen when we were on that island, this cassette is about as diverse as it is full of mystery and the unanswered question of the artist name.     It flows through the various stages of each portion, a different genre or mixture of genres, as if it was telling a story, walking down a block from house to house and observing the different people inside.    It is that true work of art because of the not only talent but way in which it presents itself that should have everyone become an instant fan.