Indie Basement (6/5): Lee "Scratch" Perry, Pixies, Widowspeak, and more classic indie

Welcome to June. We’ve got a bunch of winners here in Indie Basement this week, including a collaboration between German experimental duo Mouse on Mars and late reggae/dub icon Lee “Scratch” Perry and the winsome second album by Slippers , plus new ones from Les Big Byrd, of Montreal, Widowspeak, The Creem (members of Ratatat and Islands/Unicorns ), and a dub rework of Mekons ‘ Horror .

For this week’s Indie Basement Classic I do a two-fer from one of the biggest college radio acts of the late-’80s and early-’90s.

Over in Notable Releases , there are reviews of new albums from Converge, Bedouine, Death Cab for Cutie, Modest Mouse, Vince Staples and more.

On this week’s episode of BV Interviews I talk to Doublespeak , aka Vince Clarke (Erasure, Yazoo), Neil Arthur (Blancmange), and Benge.

Head below for this week’s reviews…

ALBUM OF THE WEEK #1 : Lee “Scratch” Perry & Mouse on Mars – Spatial No Problem (Domino)

German duo Mouse on Mars turn some of the reggae/dub icon’s final recordings into a vibrant, genre-hopping tribute

Reggae and dub icon Lee “Scratch” Perry died in 2021 and was prolific till the end. Not unlike Tupac, there have been a lot of posthumous albums claiming to be the “final” one, and who knows which will actually be the last, but this one will be hard to top.

Made with experimental German electronic duo Mouse on Mars, the bulk of the record was recorded during a whirlwind four-day session in 2019 involving a dozen musicians. The original idea was for the album to be made specifically for spatial audio, the immersive, multi-channel format that can create a 360-degree experience where sound comes from everywhere. They asked Lee if he had ever heard of it. “Spatial?” he replied. “No problem.”

Perry, meanwhile, had only one edict for Mouse on Mars: he didn’t want to make a reggae album. During the four days they spent together, they recorded nonstop while Lee redecorated the studio with his suitcase of trinkets and tokens, while he was on the mic grooving with the assembled band, while he was making Jamaican fish stew, and while the musicians worked on new ideas. It took a while for MoM’s Jan St. Werner and Andi Toma to complete the album, thanks first to the pandemic and then Perry’s death. “The sessions were quite drawn-out, you could maybe call them unsorted,” Toma told The Guardian , “but actually, about 70% of what made every song was already there: their structure, the different parts, and who added what. It developed quite organically. We only had to cut around it a little bit.”

Like a good fish stew, some things need time to marinate and simmer, and what they’ve created is a delicious concoction with an intoxicating aroma and a complex broth with lots to sink your teeth into. That stew was at least a little bit of the inspiration for Spatial, No Problem ‘s first single and opening track, “Rockcurry,” an infectious creation that sounds like something that could’ve come out of Nassau’s legendary Compass Point Studios in 1980 — think Talking Heads or Grace Jones — all giddy, playful, and very danceable. Genuinely fantastic.

The album I would most readily compare it to is David Byrne and Brian Eno’s My Life in the Bush of Ghosts , with Lee’s mystical ramblings substituting for samples of exorcists and field recordings. Musically, many of these tracks are built on krautrock rhythms, and then things go global with horns, backing singers, flutes, a variety of synthesizers, and other instrumentation.

These songs ride grooves more than they follow traditional pop structures, but St. Werner and Toma keep things engaging with inventive, trippy arrangements that feel like a tribute to Perry’s influential dub productions. This may not be a reggae album, but tracks like “Spatiallee,” “Yayaya,” and the wonderful, jazzy closer “State of Emergency” are reggae-adjacent. Then there’s “To the Rescue,” which is as dubby as it gets.

The album’s other clear standout, alongside “Rockcurry,” is “Fire Dali,” which is powered by a hypnotic two-note bassline and rolling percussion over which Perry intones as horns swell and recede. As the song fades, he sighs “Black Ark,” referencing his famed Black Ark Studios in Jamaica, which burned to the ground in 1979 (allegedly at Scratch’s own hands), as Mouse on Mars incorporate field recordings captured at the site where it once stood.

This will definitely not be the last posthumous Perry album — Adrian Sherwood says he has one coming too — but it’s hard to imagine a more fitting tribute to the legend than Spatial, No Problem .

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ALBUM OF THE WEEK #2: Slippers – Slippers 08 (K)

Winsome without ever becoming saccharine, Slippers’ second album is a jangly treat

Madeline Babuka Black, who used to play in NYC bands Yucky Duster and Beverly, and is currently in LA’s Le Pain, makes wonderful janglepop on her own as Slippers. This is her second full-length album and it’s overflowing with hooky delights and quirky charm. Like with Lande Hekt’s equally great Lucky Now from earlier this year, it’s hard not to use the word “winsome” here, but Madeline embodies the best aspects of it: sweet and just a little sad, and never saccharine. Also: memorable song after memorable song.

“Castaways” has already cast its spell on you before the twin leads enter the scene, and when it goes full George Harrison, resistance is futile. Then there’s “Wants for Everyone” that grabs you from its opening seconds: the jazzy, lightly distorted chording is an instant endorphin rush, recalling those Swedish groups from the mid-’90s (The Cardigans, Eggstone). That’s before the chorus, before the part where she sings along with the lightly gnarly guitar solo, and definitely before the “ooooooohweeoooohs” that take it into the stratosphere.

The delights keep coming: “Wasted Tonight” has 12-string arpeggios, a “Bah Bah” refrain, more twin leads, and an irresistible key change; “Until You Can’t Give Up On Me” layers in perfectly spacey keyboards; and “Fool In Your Room” is a 1:40 earworm about a post-one-night-stand escape. Who knew you could squeeze so much into such little packages? Slippers 08 is a real treat.

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Les Big Byrd – Ruin Everything (PNKSLM)

Motorik grooves, space-rock jams, and plenty of knowing humor fuel this Swedish band’s fifth album

For a Swedish motorik psych band, naming the opening song on your new album “Hökvind” is both very on the nose and hilarious. Give these guys — whose members have played in The Caesars, The Teddybears, and Fireside — credit: they are not shy about their influences, know their audience, and aren’t afraid of dumb fun and groanworthy cross-cultural puns. (This is a band who also named an album Iran Iraq IKEA .) But they also rip, as “Hökvind” makes clear — a soaring, searing, one-chord space-rock jam worthy of Warrior at the Edge of Time that needs all seven minutes to burn through the atmosphere.

Ruin Everything also has beaming Manchester-inspired psych-pop (“Artificial Sunlight,” “Searchlight”), melodic shoegaze (“Big Flood”), and Detroit-style proto-punk burners (the title track). Les Big Byrd know their audience and consistently deliver the goods.

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of Montreal – aethermead (Polyvinyl)

Kevin Barnes channels personal upheaval into one of Montreal’s rawest records

Two Thousand Twenty-Six marks of Montreal’s 30th anniversary, and the only constant across those three decades is Kevin Barnes. He has taken the band from whimsical, theatrical beginnings through their mid-’00s synthpop success and the years since, which have been a little hit or miss. Across the whole thing, Barnes has remained an artist first, never seeming to really chase fame, even during his highest-profile era when horses were sometimes brought out onstage.

aethermead is the 20th of Montreal album and was made following a lot of personal upheaval in founder Kevin Barnes’ world, including a breakup with his then-fiancée that found him relocating from Vermont to Brooklyn. This is one of the most rock-oriented of Montreal albums, with big drums, lots of guitars, and not much in the way of synthesizers. It’s still instantly recognizable as of Montreal, from Barnes’ melodies and harmonies to his sexually frustrated lyrical themes. This time it’s all filtered through the prism of a breakup record. This is from the angsty, loud “When”:

> I don’t need to be your exalted one Don’t wanna be in your social circle Don’t need to be friends with your friends I don’t really care what kind of message this sends I just wanna fuck you again I just wanna fuck you again When can I fuck you again?

Some may find it all a little TMI or cringe — Barnes admits it’s personal and confessional “to an embarrassing degree” — but it’s definitely sparked something in him. aethermead crackles with angsty energy and, musically, features some of his most engaging songs in a while, potentially ushering in yet another new era for this mercurial band.

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Widowspeak – Roses (Captured Tracks)

The Brooklyn scene may have changed, but Widowspeak’s gift for timeless songs remains intact

North Brooklyn looks a lot different from when Widowspeak first started, playing Williamsburg spots like Glasslands and Secret Project Robot. Bands have come and gone, scenes have risen and fallen, but Molly Hamilton and Robert Earl Thomas are still here, still on the same label, and with a sound that is largely unchanged from their 2011 self-titled debut.

They are also one of the best, most consistently rewarding Brooklyn bands of the last 15 years. So consistent, in fact, that Widowspeak can feel a little taken for granted, but one listen to Roses , their sixth album, and those same pleasure centers awaken again. It’s down to this: Hamilton and Thomas write finely crafted, well-observed songs that put you in a time and place, and Thomas’ production brings them to life with satisfying, dreamy, twangy arrangements. And of course they’re sung by Hamilton, who possesses a smoky, ethereal voice that lifts everything into the clouds.

As long as Widowspeak are making music, and songs as good as “Soft Cover” (easily one of their best singles), a little bit of the old Williamsburg remains alive.

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The Creem – A Taste of Cherry (self-released)

Founding members of Ratatat and Islands/Unicorns team up not for ’00s sleaze but ’70s glam

There’s been a lot of talk about “indie sleaze” (not a real term) and “Williamsburg hipsters” (who, sorry Adam Rotstein, were not into and actually predate Stomp Clap) lately, and as someone who lived in North Brooklyn during that era (and still does), I thought of all this while listening to the debut album from The Creem, the new band formed by guys who came up through the mid-’00s indie era: Islands/Unicorns’ Nick Thorburn and Ratatat’s Mike Stroud.

Fans of both acts will detect traces of Islands and Ratatat in their glam-pop sound, but A Taste of Cherry is not so much sleazy as it is coated in a distinctive mid-’70s smear of Vaseline on the lens. “Goodbye” could’ve been on Paul McCartney’s solo debut, while “A Taste of Cherry” takes the glitter and goes widescreen. Stroud’s twin-lead guitar style, which was at the core of Ratatat’s sound, is all over these songs, which play a bit like The Strokes if their chief influences were ELO and T. Rex instead of Tom Petty and Television.

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Mekons – Horrorble (Mekons vs Tony Maimone In Dub Conference) (Fire)

Mekons’ 2025 album ‘Horror’ undergoes a full-album dub mix by former Pere Ubu bassist Tony Maimone

Full-album dub mixes are back: Spoon and Panda Bear/Sonic Boom have both done them in recent years, and Primal Scream’s Echo Dek got a much-needed reissue for Record Store Day this year. All of those were reworked by Adrian Sherwood , but in this case Mekons have tapped former Pere Ubu bassist Tony Maimone to give their excellent 2025 album Horror a top-to-bottom dub version. There was already a little bit of reggae on Horror — and it wasn’t their first dalliance with the genre either — and Maimone and Mekons g

_Originally reported by [Brooklyn Vegan](https://www.brooklynvegan.com/album-reviews-mouse-on-mars-lee-scratch-perry-pixies-of-montreal-widowspeak-slippers-the-cream-les-big-bird-mekons/)._