Reykjavictim

Man straps keyboard to guitar. All hell breaks loose. Time Out meets Reykjavictim

They are actually just one person – Canadian Adam McRae, who moved to Shanghai about 18 months ago and has been playing occasional gigs in cities across China since, including opening for Chapelier Fou during March’s JUE Festival.

He sounds like a full band, but siphoned through one person, which makes for an interesting live show with McRae’s set up featuring a guitar, keyboard and lots and lots of wires. Electronic beats are merged with bursts of guitar for a sound that is equal parts Kraftwerk and Brian Jonestown Massacre.

We say We’ve been listening to Reykjavictim’s material online for a while now, but performances in Shanghai have been sporadic to date. However, now that McRae says the project has become ‘a relatively consistent entity’, we’re looking forward to catching more of his building and layering of catchy electronic-rock songs live on stage.

He says ‘My plan for the next few months is to play shows more regularly, both in Shanghai, but also taking long weekends and going to cities all over the country to play. The main part for me is about playing the shows and getting people excited about the music. And despite all the different elements, I plan to keep it a solo project – I think the aspect of all those things coming together on stage can be as interesting as the words to the songs sometimes.’ - Time Out Shanghai

We've been getting so much cool new music from China recently, the White+ we recently made our Record Of The Week, as well as the Boyz & Girl record reviewed on the same list, the Pairs cd-r from a while back, not to mention a whole bunch of titles we have in stock that just haven't made it onto the list yet. And here now is another. Sent to us direct from the band in China, who oddly enough has a sort of Icelandic name, and of course the record is called Iceland, and the man behind Reykjavictim is not in fact Chinese, but is Canadian, living in China. Phew. Needless to say, another piece of the puzzle that is the current underground / indie rock scene in Shanghai. Reykjavictim is part electronic flecked new wave rock and part homebrewed experimental pop. Fuzzed out crunchy guitars, pulsing synths, crooned vox, ping ponging melodies, the opening track fuzzy and crunchy before partway through, the drums transform into skittery drum machine, and the song becomes a sort of brooding electro pop. The second track is more of the same but stripped down. But then on "Feng Huang Qin", things get really interesting, a buzzing, Eastern sounding melody, sounding like it's being played on some traditional instrument, over a crackling bed of static and hiss, a swirl of short wave hum and pulsing whir. We wouldn't have minded if the whole record was more of this! The next track takes that Eastern melody, chops it up, and makes it into a stuttering base for some moody new wave mesmer, before the rest of the record unfurls similarly, a sort of home brewed electro wave, all fuzzed out synths, percolating rhythms, the final track a sort of Silver Apples by way of New Order.
Cool stuff for sure. LIMITED TO 200 COPIES!! Packaged in super swank, hand screened and hand written sleeves. - aQuarius Records