Who cares about 2007, anyway? The eighth decade in the so-called ‘noughties’, it’s notable for little more than John Howard’s electoral defeat, which ushered in a decade of government prevarication, kindergarten-quality social media debate and cheapskate crystal egos. 2007 is to 1968 as fish-oil supplements is to Owsley’s acid.
But Jimmy Chang seems to care about 2007, or so the post-‘80s pop song lifted off his new seven-song EP Original Changster suggests. The track itself, like the rest of the EP, is dreamy in a psychedelic-stirred-with-a-pop sort of way. Chang’s tunes are the stuff of idiosyncratic whimsy, musical visions derived on a couch on a Sunday afternoon wondering what’s going on, why we’re here, and who’s going to do something about it. Pretentious architecture in Rack Mansion, the subtle aesthetics of fashion in the Cure-ish Style’n w/Ease, economic confusion in the aquatic Ku$h On. Casa de Chang is Chang’s Roland 707-inspired home state, Greasy Moon gazes off into space through a slick’n’greasy lens and Fremantle is ethereal in the extreme. If only life was always this relaxing.
By Patrick Emery
