Dez Dare – Ulysses Trash

Dez Dare (aka Darren Smallman), the Australian born and Brighton, UK based solo purveyor of psychedelic punk is back with his sophomore full Length, Ulysses Trash, that is now available via Ch!mp Records. The album follows up and expands on his 2021 debut debut album, Hairline Ego Trip, that we described as being “an unpredictable album that lives on the edge of counter culture, right on the undefinable, original and chaotic outer limits”.

Ulysses Trash, like many of this years releases, is a product of the pandemic, Dez invested his surplus of spare time expanding his studio and sound, something that certainly beats the endless streaming of box sets and movies that many, including myself, took up as a pastime in the absence of live music. Once the studio was enhanced to his liking Dez recorded 18 brand new tracks in lockdown, 13 of which grace this eclectic and unpredictable long player.

Having previously encountered Dez Dare this time we’re ready for whatever he has to throw at us, in this case it’s a unique perspective on the destructive and self justifying nature of modern politics, so far so good as I’m guessing that if you’re reading this then we’re on the same page, or thereabouts. But what has Dez Dare unleashed sonically? The opening track, They Scream, My Head Is So Full I Can’t Dream, resembles a Gibby Haynes hallucinogenic dream brought to life and cocooned in a wall of fuzz. From here the tortured sound of fuzz being taken to it’s limit is matched with the sonics of Mudhoney and the Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster that drift in and out of the lysergic world of The 13th Floor Elevators.

Once you adapt to the lo-fi approach of the album, and if you are an audiophile that treasures a polished production then this is definitely not for you, you will find a truly unique artist who mines the darker side of psychedelia, punk and the alternative scene of the 80’s and 90’s. That description may be doing Dez a disservice as this is not an album that wears it’s influences on it’s sleeve, a guitar line here or a fuzzed out bass riff there may recall the off kilter corners off your collection, but Ulysses Trash is an album that is undoubtedly the work of the twisted mind of Dez Dare.