Campamento Ñec Ñec “Alimana” Review

How is it that the band with one with the year’s best EP in disguise as a LP can be so unknown? Not even in sense that your borderline indie, borderline corporate music mag hasn’t written about them. Not in the sense that the once-underground, now far above sea level internet hype hasn’t touched them. Not even in the sense that Zach Braff hasn’t already tried signing them on for a role as musical accompaniment to one of his many new movies that, despite correlating undertones, most definitely have different storylines than Garden State. But rather in the sense that there is no web site, there is no MySpace and there are only a scattered handful of attempts across the internet to try and define the band’s sound. There is simply little about the Spanish noise-pop trio that is out there. What is known, almost immediately to the band’s listeners however, is that Campamento Ñec Ñec plays a unique reflection of noise rock based far deeper in pop than anything the Animal Collective is widely known for.

Though, when considering the Animal Collective, and last year’s Feels in particular, something becomes to greatly relevant about the band on a global scale. Case in point: what happens when your band creates an amazing album that explores the boundaries of modern music without overwhelming listeners with media overexposure? To much of the world that means listening to an album filled with unintelligible lyrics, those which are completely foreign to their ears. But they listen anyways because in some way, shape or form, the music makes sense.

And without suggesting that the album’s speed skat which defies translation is typical Spanish dialect, it is pretty safe to suggest that Alimana is essentially Southern Europe’s Feels to its English-speaking audience. It makes no sense, musically even, and the loveable album, which neglects to span ten minutes as a whole, blends together as a dream which can only be tolerated in the context of experimentalism. Hopefully one way or another Campamento Ñec Ñec will too cross borders and find a way to offer their brand of unique music on an international scale.

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