We're A Chameleon

The new album from Melbourne duo Flying Scribble is a confounding labour of love, writes BABETTE GLADNEY.

[Historical image is withheld pending rights review.] A decade ago, Flying Scribble's Louise Terry and Gray Taylor were playing together as two-thirds of shambolic Brisbane pop group LOVEPACK alongside Mark Barrage (née Gomes). Like their erstwhile bandmate, Terry and Taylor migrated south to Melbourne, bringing with them a fervently independent approach and a mindfully slipshod aesthetic seemingly informed by cosmic kitsch, cut'n'paste and an eye for skewed theatrics.

The cohort's realisations of these ideas diverged somewhat. While Barrage honed his editing chops to create a heavily bent electronic futurism, Flying Scribble embarked on locally infamous week-long practice sessions filled with non-Western percussion, electronic drums, organs and synths. It's these extended rehearsals which have occasionally puzzled Flying Scribble's peers over the first four years of their existence. As somebody once gleefully remarked, "They work really hard, but just never seem to get any less sloppy!" That's not to say their sloppiness isn't a charm, and often it comes at the behest of ambitious instrument juggling and, in Taylor's case, curve-ball rhythms.

The pair's recording of We're A Chameleon has been similarly insular, with the duo only turning to Electric Dreams impresario Cornel Wilczek (Qua, Magic Silver White, Super Melody) for mixing. It's released on their own, newly minted Queen Silver Enterprises. So we might assume it's a largely unmediated expression of the band's vision.

“There is constant tension between order and disarray that can sometimes be distracting, with stretches of song tight enough to make you really notice when the playing comes unstuck.”

The record comes at the tail of a tentative sequence of live performances, with schedules ranging from frenetic (especially on international tours, as you'd expect) to sporadic. Even so, Terry and Taylor (sorry, but it's catchy) have mustered a following for their spacey, keyboard-driven pop songs. At the same time, their shift from earlier “indie approved” inspirations (Broadcast, Electrelane) to something reflecting what can only be described as gypsy/carnival music - driven home with romping organ riffs and thumping, heavy-swung beats - has raised a disapproving tastemaker eyebrow here and there.

If there's a broad issue to be found with We're A Chameleon, the most prominent would be its apparent struggle for dynamics and, ahem, groove. (I am ashamed for having used the word “groove”. It won’t happen again.) This is perhaps unsurprising given the instrumentation – the on/off wobble of vintage organs, the uniform attack of keyboard bass pedals, with the expressive chug and pluck of a guitar nowhere to be found – but it's emphasised by singing that often begins in too lofty a position to move any higher as songs progress. Think of Pikelet's most operatic Grammy-grabbing moments and you're halfway to understanding Flying Scribble's everyday conversational tone.

We're A Chameleon is propelled by an undeniable creative energy that has vocals doubled, keyboards multiplied and samples and live drums replacing each other effortlessly, as on ‘Keep Going’. It's only when Taylor's timing falters that we're reminded of her penchant for playing electronic drumkits, and it clicks (ha!) that it's probably been played, rather than programmed. There is constant tension between order and disarray that can sometimes be distracting, with stretches of song tight enough to make you really notice when the playing comes unstuck.

Through the collection's 11 pieces, Flying Scribble do indeed come across as chameleonic sorts. Bouncy live favourite ‘Puzzlemind’ provides a catchy refrain dressed in subtle synth squips and boings while suffering a little from the aforementioned lack of dynamics. ‘Porthole’ is one of the group's more carnivalesque numbers, built around a sort of stunted tango rhythm before it unfolds into a trimmed drum figure that nods to breakbeat patterns, accordion dutifully puffing. Songs like lead single ‘Animation In My Head’ endear the band to fellow Melbournians ninetynine (think The Process and earlier) – a comparison that makes more sense the longer you indulge it. Terry's lead vocals, while substantially more prone to soaring, sometimes bear the fragile mark of ninetynine’s Laura MacFarlane, while Taylor's drumming can be as inviting, bombastic and clumsy as Cameron Potts' was in their heyday.

The album is at its most sonically pleasing when it shies away from puff-chested pomp and indulges a rawer, simpler form – such as on the cheeky, tropicalia-inspired "Coconut Walk" or its swinging successor "Tricks in the Thick", which could easily have been recorded in the US in the late ’60s. And although it sounds like a whole bunch of other songs nobody can quite remember the name of, the disco-injected jubilant climax of ‘Tree to Tree’ is a compressed spray of pep that stands as the album’s most diverse composition. Honestly, it could have done without most of the organs, but it still registers as the album's triumphant highlight.

The record closes on a somewhat weak note: its title track, resembling ‘House of the Rising Sun’ as sloppily rendered by an organ-toting church band, or a more Enya-influenced Beach House. It's a slightly odd end to a confounding album that sounds like the labour of love that it is. As with any labour of love, there can be challenges of perspective to overcome. We're A Chameleon is full of conviction and abandon – and adventurous treatments – and in that sense of a "record", it’s a deeply textured document of a colourful pairing. Its pervasive messiness and restless aesthetic are hard to turn away from, and its idiosyncrasy is a purist's dream.

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Flying Scribble’s We’re A Chameleon is out now through Queen Silver Records/MGM Green.