Half-Handed Cloud
Indie Rock / Pop
Armed with the psalms of David, an acoustic guitar, and the electronic Omnichord, Half-handed Cloud assails nineteen new pop songs outside Eden’s gates on Halos & Lassos, the latest album on Asthmatic Kitty Records. With hints of fitness music and video game soundtracks, Halos & Lassos tromps through 19 songs like a mostly-sunny afternoon in Berkeley, California—home of bandleader John Ringhofer. With the modal purity of Moondog, symphonic elements of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, and the ancient art of punning, the album boasts pop melodies arranged around the ambidextrous Omnichord—a vintage 80’s kidney-shaped electronic auto harp/drum machine/synthesizer. This odd instrument accounts for much of the unique coloring on the album: accordion-like chords, scrupulous drum beats, pre-set bass-lines, and a rectangular pressure pad strummed for gurgle “effects.”
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