Now making his debut with the US indie label, Dead Oceans (also home to Slowdive, Japanese Breakfast and Shame), Kane Strang is the New Zealander that is making throbbing indie-rock, bearing similarities to the likes of Car Seat Headrest and Cloud Nothings. Two Hearts and No Brain follows the 2016 debut, Blue Cheese which carried a freight-load of lo-fi fuzz and forlorn lyricism. The debut, though, landed with more of a blob than a splash, despite the marvellous tracks and witty cynicism that cut deeply throughout (just listen to ‘The Web’ for a great mocking of contemporary love life). The ripple effect soon began to flourish however, with Kane Strang now donning the hat for the alt-rock scene emerging out of New Zealand, following in the footsteps of The Chills and Toy Love.

That slightly tongue-in-cheek, morbid pessimism from Blue Cheese runs throughout Two Hearts and No Brain too, mixing solemn vocal lines with hints of gloomy melody – as demonstrated on opener ‘Lagoons’ which ties Strang’s voice into jarring stop-start rhythms. It bleeds from the same artery of The Velvet Underground and The Stooges, it’s reckless and cathartic, when it finds a cooler tempo there’s a wash of iciness that morphs into Strang’s delivery. ‘See Thru’ tells of missed love conquests whilst capturing a richer, more defined sound than that outlined within the lo-fi scuzz that occupied Blue Cheese. Changing his recording style slightly gives his melodies more colour and injects elixir into the tracks whereas on Blue Cheese, they grew slightly ragged. Sounds are now expansive rather than constrained and, whereas his vocal delivery occasionally became weary across 11 tracks previously, now it feels satisfyingly full.

Elsewhere, ‘Summertime in Your Lounge’ writhes in that post-punk doom and gloom, something akin to a downtrodden Galaxie 500, Strang contrasts his sound, heaving glacial vocals atop of a growling rhythm section. ‘My Smile Is Extinct’ remarkably begins like a – wait for it – Noah And The Whale track (I’m sure you all know the one, get your ukuleles out) whilst wrapping Strang’s smart way with words through shining melodies.

Not all tracks occupy the thematic solemn coolness and drawl, when Kane tears into the rockers on the album such as the blistering ‘Not Quite’, we become the audience to his vocal lacerations, howling: “Not quite alright / Yeah, I got the whole place to myself / You’re feeling fine / You got the whole place to yourself” through the submerged echo chamber of a phaser. Another touchstone of Strang’s slightly fleshed out sound is ‘Oh So You’re Off I See’ – the first single from the album and a certain stand out. Here the New Zealander drives a bit of trepidation into his vocal tone, touching – in a similar way to Car Seat’s Will Toledo – the nerve of insecurity and anguish.

There’s a perfect sincerity that runs throughout Two Hearts and No Brain – occasionally verging on the overwrought, without ever quite tipping too far in. ‘Don’t Follow Me (I’m Lost)’ sits comfortably within its Pavement mould without becoming too desperate and needy and ‘It’s Not That Bad’, with its blips of grunge, highlights another edge to Strang’s musical blade.

It’s a superb debut for Dead Oceans from Kane Strang being part punk, part garage whilst quite bizarrely standing in a ground of its own, struggling to make for too many obvious comparisons. Perhaps it’s the uniqueness in the album that allows for Two Hearts and No Brain to be a success and, while still at the marvelously young age of 24, Strang is proving to be a real showman for the Kiwi rock scene.
Tom Churchill

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