I really have no idea why it has taken quite so long to get around to making some jottings on this latest offering from Chicago based Crown Larks, they have diligently and politely been poking me from afar for long enough. It has so many elements that are right up my Strasse – lots of changing rhythms, bits of overblown brass, a dash of flute here and there, some backward tape, a swirl of fuzzy keys and a general air of early Gong hits Rip Rig and Panic (oh so head of their time).

Maybe I have been head-down into neo-classical, folky-dude and generally too many five part harmony type stuff of late.

But I am back, unscathed and hungry for something that is a more demanding listen. Not to say Population is ‘difficult’, urgh that grisly euphemism, but it does demand listening, tugging at your ragged sleeve for attention.

Figuring in the lauded list of psych-rock albums of the year by The Quietus, it has obviously been tweaking a few earlobes since it dropped. For me psych-rock is an altogether more wah-was laden, 11 minutes early Floyd sort of thing, and all the better for that. But Crown Larks strike an altogether more jazz inflected note, a little more punk, albeit with overtones of Curved Air nostalgia.

Really this a very good set (and available in the UK via the lovely Norman Records), and I enjoy it more and more with each fresh listen; the fact that it doesn’t settle too quickly or too obviously into a pigeon hole makes it more appealing but simultaneously requiring of longer to get beneath the skin of.

If I was a younger-fella-my-lad and with any noticeable musical ability and able to play something, this feels like the sort of place I could so easily dig into and get a huge amount of playing satisfaction. But that’s not to be and so I must squeeze my vicarious pleasure out of the gift from others.

A real joy and a perfect anecdote to too much bearded, hand on ear, hipster folk rock. Go find, go listen, enjoy!