ALBUM OF THE WEEK: White Fence – For The Recently Found Innocent

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White Fence – For The Recently Found Innocent
(Drag City)
4.5 out of 5

Whilst friend and collaborator Ty Segall seems to reap all the critical and commercial dividends with his releases, it’s worth remembering that there is a much more formidable talent at work with Tim Presley; the yin to Segall’s yang. Presley has moved from hardcore punk through to psychedelia in the turn of a hat and in doing so created some rather memorable music.

So, now we get Presley’s fifth album under the moniker of White Fence, For The Recently Found Innocent, and once again Segall is involved but this time in the role of producer/mixer.

The effect is one of a sudden burst of day-glo light as Presley finds new ways to re-invent the sounds he so loves and embodies. Almost pastiche in a way, the ghosts of Syd Barrett and The Beatles loom large but they never override the huge sense of fun and excitement that you gain from listening to these songs.

It may seem a little too much for the faint hearted at first and, for all it’s attempts to subsume a very English sort of psychedelia, it works best when mixed in with more Americana aspects. Far removed from his earlier work, the stage is set with the creepy The Recently Found before a fanfare heralds the start of Angel! Who Keeps You Under, which launches us straight into Sgt Pepper land and it’s like the resulting years that followed never happened.

The production is a strange mix of light and dark, with the music kept sort of murky until the moments when the more outre shines through. Nowhere is this more evident than on the classic pop of Like That, which releases a toybox of lysergic wonders and is completely irresistible.

Presley doesn’t like to rest on his laurels though and perhaps the one downfall of the album is a lack of cohesion to the songs in that they drift from maudlin introspection to out and out pop. This is no bad thing though, as the strength of songs such as Arrow Man and Fear are enough to keep you interested. It just means that the album takes more than one listen to fully appreciate it’s wonders, but then isn’t that what all great albums should do?

The LP is best summed up by the excellent Goodbye Law, which seems to last an age with it’s slight acoustic melody bringing in a Laurel Canyon feel (in reality only lasts two and a half minutes). Like some long lost companion to some of the more freakier moments of Nuggets, it has the feel of a lost gem and one gets the feeling that this is an album for the ages. It’s a brave record which builds on the recent Doug Tuttle album in returning psych to it’s pop roots, but also takes it three steps further. There are have been some great psych albums this year, but White Fence set the standard for the return to the 60’s feel and you’ll have many hours of enjoyment getting lost in it’s myriad of psychedelic abandon.

Martyn Coppack