Blake Scott - Niscitam album review

BLAKE SCOTT
Niscitam
WING SING

The solo debut from The Peep Tempel’s captain is expectedly confronting, gruff and grimy lead guitar lines clashing and clanging with an equally idyllic and unnerving crudity; there’s the looming threat that at any second, the mix could erupt into hellish disarray – and yet it’s never jarring or distasteful. 

It’s a calculated, cerebral discomfort that Scott embraces, his dark and sultry ruminations twisting and twining around riffs that outright command your attention. But there too are slivers of arcadian elegance to be unearthed on Niscitam – a crisp and charismatic noodling on “Bullfloat Zen” and simmering bassline on “Kalashnikov”, for example. 

In all, it’s a tense and timely masterpiece on which Scott falls into the role of Australiana rock dog with enthralling ease and infallible authenticity.