BUTTER SWAMP TAKE A WRONG TURN AND FIND SOMETHING BETTER

We Took The Wrong Turn 17 Waves Ago turns Butter Swamp's lo-fi devocore instincts into a stranger, more collaborative six-song trip with VÍVICA

Butter Swamp allow the machinery to wobble in a new direction. Crazy Horse is joined by VÍVICA, and the six tracks feel like a bedroom-punk sketchbook and a conversation that keeps slipping into unexpected rooms.

“sawyer” and “reciprocity who?” establish the record's compact, nervy approach, and “cherub band blues” is where I really feel the collaboration clicking. The 1:42 runtime is almost comically brief, yet the song sits inside the project's peculiar meeting point of egg punk, folk, hypnagogic pop and lo-fi experimentation. “requiem” then gives the record its longest stretch, while “i feel good (mori cover)” closes things by turning outward toward another songwriter's material.

What I find most appealing is the roughness. Lo-fi isn't a limitation by any means, and I hear that philosophy here. The imperfect edges become part of the arrangement and there's nothing to hide.

VÍVICA changes the emotional texture without sanding away Butter Swamp's eccentricity. I recommend this to anyone who likes punk songwriting when it gets weird and deliberately unpredictable.

(•)> That's all, Folks! Check out Butter Swamp on the Pigeon Opinion Playlist