Making Horrible Music For Teens

Electric Six “Psychic Visions”

Heartwaves and Brainwaves, this year’s new Electric Six album, is basically the band’s Depeche Mode record. This isn’t a huge surprise – Dick Valentine often sings a bit of “Everything Counts” at the end of “Germans In Mexico” in concert, and there’s already a precedent set for dark, keyboard-heavy material in the larger Valentine catalog. “Psychic Visions,” the opening track on the album, is delightfully seedy – it’s like “Nightclubbing” cut with “Personal Jesus,” with Valentine’s hyper-masculine voice taking on a weathered, resigned tone. He sounds defeated but bemused by the world around him, and when he sings about psychics and tarot cards, you can hear the pessimism in his voice, but also a willingness to play along with other people’s banal eccentricities, if just for a brief distraction.

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