The latest release from Barons Hawley affirm their place as arguably the best post-rock ensemble to come out of the emerging avante-grunge scene in their native Uzbekistan. Soaring melodies collide with brilliant percussion, especially the title track, a 22-minute reflection on the comparative merits of various household cleaning products that includes possibly the most evocative interplay between sampled birdsong tracks and sandpaper scratching that has ever been committed to tape. Barons heads into the murkier emotive waters of relationships for the album's evocative centerpiece, "She Left for Gdansk Last Tuesday and Took All Our Brill-O," which concludes with an epic solo by drummer Yrednin Sblanchec, showcasing off his amazing cymbal work. Not content to stop there, the group plunges ahead into the political world with "She Puked When I Hit Her and It Looked Like Yeltsin," which resulted in the Turkish leg of the group's tour being abruptly canceled after threats of retaliation by religious groups. Showing their versatility, and perhaps giving a slight nod to those western critics who have labeled their work "Unapproachable even as toilet paper" (NY Times, 7/15/2007), they end the 3-disc set with a 45-minute cover of Brittany Spears, Oops, I Did It Again that may be their most commercially accessible recording ever. Sadly, the Barons are said to decided to call it quits after this recording was made, citing both artistic tension and the personal issues arising from the marriage of lead flutist Smaelmae Uaremptz to a goat. But they certainly leave with a bang - an actual bang, in this case, which can be heard about 10 minutes into the second disc, and may be the only actual live recording of the infamous terrorist attack on a bank in the city of Jizzakh, in which no lives were lost due to the inability of the terrorists to say "Jizzakh" and keep a straight face.
Will be enjoyed by: Eastern Europeans, the profoundly deaf, and Catholic bishops.
