Clockwork Curiosities

Enter a labyrinth of aural deception in which you can trust nothing and no-one. The brainchild of Professor Singleton Purblind and Lon Lippincott, with assistance from vocalists Shugmonkey and Gus Isambard and bassist Andy Kremer, this album has a cast of characters as bewildering as its musical mash-up.

Cut’n’paste electronics and samples with a DJ Shadow aesthetic conjure up an unlikely world of Victorian London. There is a dark, criminal streak to this album. It alludes to body-snatchers, Frankenstein’s monster, grim back-alley murders and unspoken perversions hidden behind the respectable Victorian façade of terribly well-spoken vocals. ‘A Three Pipe Problem’ is a bizarre Sherlock Holmes mystery peppered with cameos by East End music-hall characters. Sherlock’s violin appears to begin sawing across the soundtrack on ‘Barmy Ginger’. Meanwhile, the bells and mechanical sounds of ‘Hyde’ bring to mind the chimes and clicks of MIA’s ‘Paper Planes’ or Pink Floyd’s ‘Money’, only eerier and wackier. At other points, such as ‘Hot Snook Murder’, there are musical snippets that could come straight from a PG Wodehouse dramatisation, with a skipping 1920s jazz rhythm. This is truly weird stuff.