Mi Ami – ‘Watersports’

Touch And Go/Quarterstick Records

 It’s a cruel injustice to limit this chaotic seven-track collection to a CD player in the corner of the room. As increasingly intriguing and addictively unsettling as ‘Watersports’ is by the listen, the live environment is really where these songs belong: somewhere to accommodate the improvisation and deconstruction that Mi Ami obviously thrive upon. As a band manipulating “rhythm, negative space, and the physicality of a song”, the San Francisco based trio will always matter more on stage than they ever will in the studio for that very reason. Yet, by taking in elements of dub, jazz, disco and African rhythms on ‘The Man in Your House’ and the standout ‘Pressure’, and with an unnerving and deliberate cat wail vocal eluding to fear and anxiety though out, there are still enough varying textures of ugliness to make ‘Watersports’ a compelling listen from start to finish. Now lets see it live!

 7/10

Download: ‘The Man In Your House’, ‘New Guitar’, ‘Pressure’

For fans of: Gang of Four, Prolapse