Album Review: Rays – Self Titled

Rays are a band that is comprised of four Bay area music veterans whose current and past musical projects include local bands of note such as The World, Life Stinks, Violent Change, and Dadfag, that means Rays are something of an underground supergroup that was born of the golden states dark recesses. The band’s self titled debut album was released at the end of last month and is now available on CD and good old fashioned black vinyl via Trouble In Mind Records

The opening plodding discordant chords of Attic bring to mind the more experimental side of the UK’s post punk scene and the fledgling indie scene that followed in it’s wake, Rays have released an album that has come distinctly out of leftfield, there is nothing predictable and the album takes you on a rambling discordant journey across it’s brief run time of a shade under twenty five minutes. Tracks such as Gambler and Theatre Of Lunacy provide the album’s most coherent moments, but for the main part this is a album that channels the more idiosyncratic elements from punk, post punk and the early indie scene.

Rays self titled debut comes across as the troubled offspring of post punk bands such as The Fall and Wire, along with a fair influence from the UK indie scene of early eighties, the whole album has a loose shambolic feel to it and you have to admire an album that seems to give no fucks whatsoever about commercial intent, this is the album Rays wanted to make and there is clearly no compromise. This is not an album that sits easily in your head, there are too many dark and discordant twists and turns for this to be a regular on your playlist, but when the moment is right you’ll be glad this is sitting and lurking in the corner of your collection.

You can stream Rays debut album here and it can be purchased here