The Brian Jonestown Massacre
Aufheben
![](https://www.independent.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/17/BJM.jpg)
This latest release by Anton Newcombe and his cohorts — including founding Brian Jonestown Massacre members Matt Hollywood and Joel Gion, as well as ex-Spacemen 3/Spiritualized member Will Carruthers — is actually the band’s most accessible album in years. Taking its Germanic title from the Hegelian concept of thesis and antithesis interacting to sublate, Aufheben finds Newcombe deconstructing elements of world, trance, electronic, ’60s Euro-pop, and psychedelic music in order to produce something fluid and invigorating. The Muslimgauze-ish “Panic in Babylon,” child-like “The Clouds Are Lies,” and “Stairway to the Best Party in the Universe” (which seductively mimes the Stones’ “Paint It Black”) are the stand-out tracks, but the pan-pipe-laden “Face Down on the Moon” and Eurotrashy “Gaz Hilarant” are also intriguing. Meanwhile, Newcombe’s always playful song titles (“I Want to Hold Your Other Hand,” “Blue Order/New Monday”) play cheeky homage to the sonic architects of yore.