Deerhunter - Halcyon Digest, 2010.

Deerhunter are nothing if not productive. Last month’s Halcyon Digest was the Atlanta-based psychedelic foursome’s sixth major release in as many years; not surprising considering principal songwriter Bradford Cox’s battle with Marfan syndrome, shortening his life expectancy, and perhaps a wish to release the most material possible. More explicitly than in previous work, Cox’s illness is disturbingly prevalent lyrically in Halcyon Digest, lamenting in Basement Scene his aversion to growing old, while Memory Boy and Desire Lines express a vehement repulsion of solitude. However, album closer He Would Have Laughed (this year’s Nothing Ever Happened, Deerhunter fans) documents the boredom associated with ageing and perhaps an acceptance of his position.

Had Coldplay written major hit Clocks after spending their youth listening to My Bloody Valentine rather than U2, then first single Revival might have been the result; guitarist Lockett Pundt produces the band’s most agreeable pop melody yet, however he really comes to the fore in self-penned Desire Lines. Beginning in the same vein as the current American surf pop scene advocated by Best Coast and Wavves, the album’s seven-minute centrepiece eventually culminates with Deerhunter’s trademark hypnotism. Stand-out Helicopter is the band at their thunderous best, as waves of warped guitar drone to a climatic crescendo of Cox’s longing whines concerning loss of company and a minimal existence, from the peculiar viewpoint of a fictional Russian prostitute.

For all their somewhat downbeat lyrics, and colossal, engulfing, none-too-uplifting production, Halcyon Digest stands true as Deerhunter’s most life-affirming work yet. Saxophones and mandolins are delightfully unexpected additions to the band’s perpetually overwhelming sound, which was in danger of becoming monotonous and overbearing had it not been tweaked and improved over the course of their relentless output, which hopefully will not be capped anytime soon.