[CD Review] Seefeel, 'Quique: Redux Edition' (Too Pure)

The shoegazer-rock revival has been gathering steam over the past five years, but amid all the My Lush Slow Ride worship, one crucial innovator in the genre has been overlooked: Seefeel. Of all the shoegazers, Seefeel were the least rock-oriented. In fact, the British quartet had more in common with Brian Eno's aqueous and spacey ambiance and Aphex Twin's early variations of same than with their more earthbound peers.

Featuring vocalist Sarah Peacock's feathery ululations and Mark Clifford's radiant guitar spray and luxuriantly layered production, Seefeel came across as a perfect hybrid of My Bloody Valentine, Aphex Twin and Cocteau Twins. For many Seefeel fans, their 1993 debut album, Quique, represents the band's peak. Seefeel gradually migrated to vaunted IDM labels Warp and Rephlex, where their increasingly chilly and fractured electronic deviations found a more logical home.

Quique begins with "Climactic Phase No. 3," whose goosebump-inducing oscillations sound like exotic sea-life mating calls given the Black Ark dub treatment, with Eno at the controls instead of Lee Perry. Dub has never been this levitational, nor shoegaze rock this shimmeringly dispersed; MBV seem like Black Sabbath in comparison. It's an auspicious opening for an album that immerses you in textures at once silky, amniotic and vaporous. But despite its diaphanous quality, the music on Quique exudes a languid, if oblique, sensuality. As much as they conjure heavenly etherealness, the nine songs here will definitely stir physical reactions that you want to be stirred.

The bonus CD contains nine more tracks of alternate mixes and previously unreleased material. It makes for a sublime nightcap following the ambrosial banquet of Quique proper. This is music as serene sigh, all graceful-yet-subdued flourishes and intoxicating atmospheres. Forget shoegazer; Quique is moon-boot rock.