Ty Segall – Manipulator
- Written by Lee Hammond
One of the most prolific men in indie music right now is back with yet another album, Manipulator is Ty Segall’s fifteenth in a relatively short space of time. From the off, title track ‘Manipulator’ sets out his full intention for the album, chirpy melodies open up before Ty’s distinctive vocals kick in. The guitars get heavier and fuzzier throughout the track and chants of “Manipulator” add to the swirling track.
The album moves quickly before a slow jam in the form of ‘The Singer’ sharp stabs of guitar accompany Ty’s vocals. As the track continues despite its slower tempo it gets increasingly louder as the layers of instrumentation increase and the atmosphere created builds as it reaches its crescendo.
Quickly though he’s picking the pace up again with ‘It’s Over’ the duelling guitars on this track sound unbelievably fierce. It’s almost like a duel to the death, this is Ty Segall at his best and we’re barely into the album. Chanting, “It’s Over” repeatedly as the track comes to a close as it ends in a sonic battle of guitar power.
Manipulator is packed full of super sonic guitars and its almost hard to believe how sonically brilliant this album is from the off and throughout. ‘Feel’ is truly unreal how many guitars are packed into such a small space, dense layers of squealing guitars played at breakneck speed.
New single ‘The Faker’ is a little toned down but it allows us to focus a little more on the lyrics, Ty Segall writes some great lyrics. They’re perhaps not the deepest but he writes some great hooks and ‘The Faker’ is no different as he snarls, “ask your boss man for a raise!”
There’s a relentless pace to the album, if its not an electric guitar he’s picked up an acoustic. ‘Green Belly’ is another excellent song maintaining the tempo just this time utilising an acoustic guitar, allowing us to really focus on his lyrical genius instead of his phenomenal guitar playing.
‘The Hand’ has an almost classic rock feel to it, its opening wouldn’t be out of place on a Bon Jovi track, which to some may set off alarm bells but this is Ty Segall. He quickly gets into his stride as he croons his way through something that turns into psychedelic jam, as it swirls into something very different as the track continues.
As the album draws to its close there’s still time for a couple more raucous outings and arguably the heaviest of these is ‘The Crawler’. From the off there are dense layers of guitars all over the track, the intensity of the track draws you in as Ty chants “I am the crawler.”
‘ The Feels’ has a much heavier feel to it, the riffs are harder the whole feel of the track is a lot darker. As a lone guitar squeals over the top Ty’s high-pitched vocals drift along the top line, yet another masterful tune on what is a truly phenomenal album.
Manipulator is arguably Ty Segalls best album to date, he may be prolific but in our eyes hes yet to release anything that’s been below par. He is always improving and we can’t wait to see what he has up his sleeve for his next album and we’re sure it won’t be long before we get to hear it.
Manipulator is released on August 25 and available from amazon & iTunes.