Fluorescent Heights “Beyond the Waves of Lust”

13 Feb 2013 — Henning Lahmann

It sometimes seems as if the ancient art of pure, blissful tropical haze has been lost ever since James Ferraro went all post-apocalyptic digital glare, Sun Araw went to Jamaica, and Ducktails went full-on shiny charts pop. Okay, this might be both an over-simplification and a slight exaggeration, but you get the idea. Anyway, good thing is we have Swedish artist Henrik Stelzer aka Fluorescent Heights, whose 2011 debut Tourism had left us all gleaming and pleasantly intoxicated. Follow-up Vendetta in Paradise continues to sonically exploit the realms of humid, sweaty beaches somewhere south of here, albeit adopting an overall tone that's considerably more unsettling and disconcerting: 'There are bloodstains on your Hawaiian shirts and you know why', the press release reads; we swear we don't, and we're actually not sure if we really want to find out.

Vendetta in Paradise is out on cassette via the excellent SicSic Tapes.