Fish From Tahiti - Decal Baby

Fish From Tahiti - Decal Baby
Harbinger Sound LP


Who are these Feeshes from Tahiti? Leetle Feeshes. From Taheeeti. Obscure beyond words. A band with no web presence on a label with virtually no web presence, or presence that's of any use [HS website front page is still showing the flyer for last years Soundclash show in Belgium]. Type in ‘Fish From Tahiti’ and you will get just shy of a million hits with just shy of a million of them being information and pictures about fish from Tahiti but there at the top of the pile is a Youtube video of a Fish From Tahiti release called  ‘Weird Noise E.P.' Which since being uploaded two years ago has garnered a meagre 304 hits and the one comment [‘Top’] which totally un-oddly enough doesn't appear on this collection of obscure beyond words singles and compilation submissions and unreleased material.

So far so normal then for the label that has for years been more than comfortable shuffling around in the brick gaps of the, dare I even say it, ‘underground’.

What better to confound those who have come to Harbinger Sound via the Sleaford Mods. I am a Sleaford Mods fan hence I go out and buy everything that appears on their label because, QED, I must like everything that label puts out. But this is no Sub Pop here, no Domino. If you are a Sleaford Mod fan on the bus home with Decal Baby under your arm you are going to be baffled, confounded and perhaps upset when you get home to find that your two pronged social despair attack and angst has been replaced by 14 tracks of looped dub upon which straight lifts from language tapes have been layered.

Its not all like that of course, although I must admit to liking the French and Mandarin voices I’m hearing. In some instances there are rapid drum and bass assaults and things that sounds like Milk From Cheltenham outtakes and 1930’s jazz dance bands but for the most part we’re in crumbly loops of dub with added things territory. Things being either squiggles of electronica, or English lessons as read by 50’s BBC announcers or just plain old weirdness. Depending on your point of view this is either the bastard offspring of Paul Hardcastle’s ’19’ or the demented re-workings of the Art of Noise by people who went to Dada School.

What lifts this from such drollery is its obscurity and repeat play-a-bility. I dare say that the Fish From Tahiti fan club could easily fit into a Volkswagen Polo. A car that could take them to gigs that they’ve never played or record fairs where their records never turn up. In the meantime you have this LP. Just don’t ask me where you can buy it.