Album Review: Suuns - Zeroes QC

The debut LP from Montreal four-piece Suuns (the similarly-titled Zeroes EP preceded it last year) announces itself with a distinctive, deep, creaking bassline; this is then joined by handclaps, spacey synths and steady percussion as the song suddenly switches gear and heads off into almost blues-rock territory, riding an imposing, grinding guitar riff. In many ways, this entrance typifies the group’s adventurous approach: there’s an impressive range of sounds and styles on show throughout Zeroes QC, bouts of guitar-shredding rubbing shoulders with electronic textures and patient atmospherics.
 
Tracks like ‘Gaze’ and ‘Sweet Nothing’ exhibit lean, sinewy grooves and insistent rhythms - the former recalling Queens Of The Stone Age, while the latter displays an absorbing krautrock pulse that gives way to frenzied guitar-squall. Elsewhere, ‘Arena’ is a more electronic affair that boasts a looping, twirling main hook and a smooth, limber bassline, while ‘Pie IX’ features muffled vocal incantations and warped-sounding electronic touches.
 
So far, so impressive-sounding; but there’s something a bit cold and clinical about it all: the tempo shifts and stylistic flourishes are admirable up to a point, but for all the dexterity on show there’s no track here that really digs its claws into you. It’s already been pointed out elsewhere how much of a sonic debt ‘Up Past The Nursery’ and ‘PVC’ owe to Clinic, while choosing to end the album with two sleepy-eyed, down-tempo tracks (‘Fear’ and ‘Organ Blues’, neither of which pull up any trees) makes for some jarring sequencing. Suuns have plenty of potential for improvement, but for now Zeroes QC lacks the cutting edge that separates the great from the merely good.