Album Review: Diagonals Dabble In Gutter Psych With Valley of the Cyclops

Steve Garcia has a reputation in town, but not in the skanky sense - he's a familiar face at your local I Luv Video, and he has already made a name for himself rock-wise in the apparently defunct Black Lipstick. Stepping into the spotlight with Diagonals, Garcia has traded up from the catchy but often transparent licks of his past project and into a full-force psychedelic machine. Austin seems to be undergoing a garage rock revival, and no doubt a backlash is coming and the very mention of these words will send some listeners screaming in the other direction. But like label mates the Pillow Queens or recent Austin transplants Harlem, Diagonals spike their brew with something comfortable but not worn-in. That's not to say the band don't lean on their idols, as both the wicked opener "Wizard Dome" and "Drone of Stone" pretty much recycle Rolling Stones riffage for the band's own snaky designs, but thankfully, the band continue past some light lifting into more tasty territories.

Most of Valley of the Cyclops, this band's debut LP, trades in a raucous, fast rhythm coupled with Garcia's mostly deadpan vocal delivery. Lyrics tend to highlight the nasty and denigrated but with an obvious touch of humor - take "Neil Diamond's Blues," for example, which re-imagines the crooner as a washed up womanizer who has a fleeting bathroom romance with Carol, a prostitute who lives in a van parked outside of Home Depot. Along with the group's echoey guitar, Diagonals' ace in the hole may be the organ work of Wiley Wiggins (yes, that guy), which gives Valley of the Cyclops an eerie undercurrent of beauty. This being the band's first record, there's definitely room to grow, and a sharpening of some of the more repetitive, less exacting song structures could only do us a favor . For now, though, Diagonals have a fine formula - one parked between the heady, sweaty days of rock yore and the glowing embers of ruthless peers The Flaming Stars and more.

Valley of the Cyclops is the fifth installment of Monofonus Press's "If" series, which pairs the visual arts with the musical. Michael Berryhill contributes both the album art and a short comic entitled I Could Be Happy, about an initially sympathetic character who finds ways to rationalize his cruelty.

Diagonals: [myspace]