Cellar Doors. California’s newest too-cool-for-school psychedelic rock band. Is it possible for an album to be more inconsequential? An album so pointless, they didn’t even bother giving it a title.

Not too bad, not too good, if anyone wants to read 300 words about a record that won’t affect your life at all, then by all means, read on.

How can record companies be so shameless and masochistic as to actively promote records that no one will ever think are worth writing about? There’s nothing on this thing that will even possibly become one of your favourites of 2019. It’s actually so by-the-numbers that if the record wasn’t self-titled, you would think anyone could have made it, likely as a B-sides comp. The closest thing we get to a stand-out track is ‘Frost,’ which is sure to join the pantheon of modern rock songs which feature an epic, transcendent build-up, only to oh-so-fucking-ironically stop right before the climax. I’m sure they intended for listeners to think “Wow, what a journey that was, notice how it ends so abruptly, juxtaposing their massive song with silence, what true artistry.”

Except, in reality, what happened was that I nearly cringed at the implication of a band releasing an essentially unfinished song that has to rely on a cheap, clichéd ending technique because they don’t have a fucking clue how to make their tracks sound dynamic.

I’d like to note that although this is a debut album, these are not songs that were written recently; I saw them perform a good portion of these numbers two years ago. Unbelievable.

Don’t let the ‘psychedelic’ tag fool you; there is nothing experimental or forward-thinking about this band, nor is this record a charming ode to the past. It’s a throwaway record that you’ll forget about a month after listening to it. It’s not trippy, it’s just blurry. At best, these songs belong as background noise for a film or video game, and at worst, they are an inoffensive stain on creativity.

Two stars.

Zack Moore