The world is an unpredictable place, so one derives comfort every six months when Boston’s arcane, slime mold-monikered, one-man Physarum faithfully drops two more of his succinct, 10-song, weirdly-titled, GBV producer Todd Tobias-mastered, amber-colored with flora/fauna artwork LPs — his 21st and 22nd since November 2020 — for an inflation-resistant $1.79 each. Unlike artists who constantly need to reinvent, he doggedly adheres to a rigid songwriting blueprint: tight, electric, ‘70s-style classic-rock riffs with subtly varying textures, sporadic acoustic (plus strings and horn, briefly!), light drum machine (“I.S.S.”), and his high-pitched, treated vocals. But as always, each concise tune is distinguished most by his ambiguous, whimsical lyrics.
Throughout both albums, dark, philosophical musings on life, death, and politics (“The Wheel,” “Leave a Stain,” “The Final State,” “A Banner Day For Little Men”) mingle with peculiar, desultory vignettes about empowering playthings (“Scary Doll”), tranquil glade reveries (“Sunshower”), metal-wielding playwrights and swordsmen (“Novel Iron”), soup-fortified huntsmen (“Father Doom”), pipe-smoking fugitives (“Bungalow Candy”), reclusive lunar boulders (“The Moon Rock”), mischievous snakes (“Come Slither”), pilfered horror magazines (“Gorezone”), fatigued abattoir workers (“The Iron’s Toll”), scheming truants (“Dear Mr. DiMinico”), recalcitrant motorbikers (“Diamond Diesel”), perilous sleepwalking obstacles (“The Landing”), and eerily-illuminated bedroom shadows (“The Hanging Moon”).
Physarum: Bandcamp | From the Keep Records: Website
