New Music: Atlas Sound (Deerhunter frontman Bradford Cox): "Unicorn Rainbow Odyssey" (Mark Sultan cover)
Bradford Cox wasn't fronting when the singer for Atlanta avant-punks Deerhunter told Pitchfork recently about his interest in girl groups. Under his Atlas Sound solo guise, Cox has recorded a cover of "Unicorn Rainbow Odyssey", a lo-fi doo-wop song recently released on the album Sultanic Verses by Montreal rocker Mark Sultan (who also performs as BBQ and recently joined soul-funker King Khan as the King Khan & BBQ Show). Evidently, Sultan wrote the song for Mary Weiss of the Shangri-Las, who supposedly turned it down for being too depressing.
Cox's version, recorded on his May 15 birthday, downplays the guitar skronk that takes up the foreground in the original, sinking it beneath an Enchantment Under the Sea Dance sea of looped harmonies. Cox's clear tenor also collapses into the mix, so his vocals might take a little effort to discern. At least until the chorus, which shatters the romantic fantasy of so much doo-wop while at the same time strengthening this cover's spell: "Fairy tales don't come true/ And it's all a bunch of lies." Waves crest, cymbals shake with emotion or just exhaustion, and like Morrissey on the Smiths' "I Know It's Over", the singer is on his own.
MP3:> Atlas Sound: "Unicorn Rainbow Odyssey" (Mark Sultan cover)
[cover is previously unreleased; Sultan's version is from Sultanic Verses, out now on In the Red]