The Stillwater-based psychedelic act closed the curtain on last month’s Buffalo Lounge events at South by Southwest with a dazzlingly deafening set of material new and old, raising the already-high bar for one of Oklahoma’s most established and prodigious acts. Thankfully, May You Marry Rich — the band’s third studio album — by and large meets these expectations, even occasionally exceeding them.
Stylistically, the album exists somewhere between Can’s dizzying krautrock and the neo-psychedelia of Primal Scream or Spacemen 3. And in its most enthralling moments, its songs are defined by brooding, slow-burning atmosphere, as evidenced by “Idiot”; “Dreamgirl ’82”; and the devastatingly hypnotic “Satyricon,” the album’s most entrancing standout.
This is mood music in the truest sense; it has the ability to penetrate, alter and occupy your subconscious while submerging you in the surreal. But it’s also the work of consummate professionals with the ability to manipulate sound in any setting, and from a technical standpoint, there aren’t many around these parts who do it better.
Oddly enough, May You Marry Rich is the band’s first full-length without a color in its title. Here, the subtlety of its songs comprise the palette of hues, shades, tints and tones, and their imagery is more evocative than at any other moment in Colourmusic’s career. — Zach Hale
