(Credits: Far Out / Kate Garner)

THE SKINNY: Sometimes an album implores you to slowly pore over its finer details, to call a psychologist about its crooned lyrics, to probe at its musical constitution on pro-tools, to dismantle what exactly it is that you’re getting from it and what the artist intended to give you. With Paint a Room, Chris Cohen and his many indie collaborators have created the exact inverse of that.

Immediately, the pungent perfume lifting off the vinyl is so intense that you’re instantly transported to some early 1980s lounge bar where everything seems to be made of Burt Reynolds’ chest hair, or at least capture its essence. Everything else fades into the background of this bewildering, gaudy facade. Jeff Parker’s horn arrangements almost feel like a parody of the sticky tones you’d expect to hear piped out in a restaurant frequented by Patrick Bateman.

So, all that remains is whether that’s a bad thing or not. During his years in Deerhoof, Chris Cohen was not the most expressive of artists, but here he’s effectively compèring a jazz and poetry night at the yacht club. In short, it is certainly not the record you’d expect. But once again, the task for fans is to decipher whether that’s a bad thing or not. The problem is, you’re not left with much brain space to ever engage in too much discerning. The lava lamp tonality keeps you too preoccupied for that, creating a record akin to Mulholland Drive in many ways.

If you do ever penetrate the odd surface – a Westworld recreation of peak early ’80s utterly artless artfulness – then you find a core of clever pop, reminiscent of Cohen’s complex indie ingenuity in Deerhoof, you find florid kaleidoscopic flourishes and a busy interplay of arrangements, reminiscent of his production mastery, you find soft porno horns fucking over the top of everything, reminiscent of Boogie Nights playing in the background, and lyrically you’ll detect the effusive ramblings of a former introvert who has had a therapy breakthrough and is now keen to attempt to tell you his thoughts on the “damaged” modern world and where we fit in it, reminiscent of a great musician who has decided to become a songwriter.

In the end, you find too much of everything, most notably dissonance, but you find nothing in the way of an identifiable Chris Cohen. It’s clever and inventive, insomuch as the Hindenburg was clever and inventive—it’s music to die to and to die from.

For fans of: Waxing your own asshole to ensure maximum Vitamin-D intake while ‘perineum sunning’, liking your jazz a little more left-field than Steely Dan, and drinking Strawberry Daiquiris after a gong bath.

A concluding comment from the Paint a Room marketing board: “Have you ever wondered what it would be like to listen to Roxy Music and watch Twin Peaks on mute at the same time while being lobotomised by the surgeon from the Alec Baldwin movie Malice? Well, you needn’t look no further than this record. [Best enjoyed in a floatation tank].”

Paint a Room track by track:

Release date: July 12th | Producer: Chris Cohen | Label: Hardly Art

‘Damage’: The horns are schmoozy to an almost perverse degree, welcoming you into the album like you’ve just strolled onto the set of Dallas. The intensity of the cocktail chinking and velour boudoir vibe that the instrumentation conjures makes for a relatively overwhelming listen on early spins. [3.5/5]

‘Paint a Room’: And now we waltz into the leopard print room. Here, you can enjoy a neck-rub from a trained, handsy person while sipping something containing ginseng, or you can simply chew the fat with all the other account executives enjoying their stay at the Pleasure Pavilion Hotel. [3/5]

‘Sunever’: An upbeat riff injects some sudden spring-like tempo into the record as Cohen sings of connecting with nature – the first easily identifiable glimpse at the album’s core theme of transcendentalism – while Nintendo-like overdub sounds provide a wallop of quirkiness. [3.5/5]

‘Cobb Estate’: A strange composition moves between dissonant moments and periods that sound like ‘Avalon’ performed by a recently institutionalised Roxy Music. This peculiar melody is paired with a vocal topline that rambles more aimlessly than a moth looking for a window. But if all that sounds scathing, then I’m doing it a disservice because it is at least interesting and bizarrely atmospheric. [2.5/5]

‘Laughing’: Wavering vocal distortion makes for a very colourful intro, but it quickly becomes the sort of avant-gardery that has you saying, ‘Ah fuck off and get a proper job’, which is a shame. You’re not like that, you love Sun O))) and have listened to Metal Machine Music all the way through, but there is just something about this intro that grates on you. The pleasant-adjacent song that follows suffers as a result. [2/5]

‘Wishing Well’: The complex bass syncopation and bubbly tones are indicative of Cohen’s supreme skill as a producer as he channels his inner T Bone Burnett. Alas, lyrically and vocally, it’s a bit harder to move to, creating a jarring clash between the groovy and grooveless elements of the song. [2.5/5]

‘Dog’s Face’: Piano takes the dominant lead as a Can beat plays on. Initially, it’s a more casual cut for the record, fit for a sauna playlist, but soon, bursts of Trout Mask guitars are splattered onto the mix. Alas, it’s a subdued version of Beefheart, and I’m just not sure that works. [1.5/5]

‘Night or Day’: Throughout the highs and lows of the album, there is no doubt that Chris Cohen knows what he’s doing musically. The utterly beautiful melody he arrives at here proves that. There might be dissonant breakdowns and constant evolutions, but this is simple and supreme. The record’s best. [4/5]

‘Physical Address’: The hotel lobby sound once again returns as does the lack of melody in Cohen’s flat vocal wandering. Where does this music belong? [2/5]

Randy’s Chimes: How does a record like Paint a Room end? It doesn’t: it peevishly weaves through so many changes that it creates the illusion of eternities. [1/5]