Dez Dare is a punk rock astronaut. A psych-noise shaman. A DIY Doctor Manhattan. With the 11-track A Billion Goats. A Billion Sparks. Fin., Dare heads beyond our reality and embraces the practice of "sarcastic existentialism." Sure, some of its just a Millenial-tinged take on Devo ("Got a Fire In My Socket"), or even a more dweeby Liars ("No One Wants to Hear It"). But there's no doubt that Dare understands what it takes to make punk into a rocket ship for barrelling into the great unknown, and these are cosmic-coated samplers. Once the aural concoction hits our bloodstream, we get "Call My City, Don't Call My Telephone," a surge of post-punk transmogrifying across dimensions in front of our very eyes. Or, "Schrödinger's Apocalypse," where like some punk rock Annihilation, we see garage rock DNA reassemble in intriguing new directions. By the time we get to the eight-minute "The Elasticity Of Knowing," the realms between punk and, well, everything else have been blown apart, leaving us to meander around a black light poster of a burnt out Brighton. What makes this journey rewarding — and not just more overly involved punk — is that Dare's efforts aren't wholly about transcendence. It's about the possibility of change, and the glory of unknowing once it's all broken down. He's not some guru but a dimension-hopping goblin who shows us what's capable as punk grows ever more interested in both self-discovery and blowing down its own shoddy walls. He's not shown us higher truths but guided us, through familiar rhythms and unknown extensions, into a strange and totally wondrous territory. The only true insight comes with the the closer, "Billion Voices Screaming, Hello Void!," when Dare utters, "We all return to where we begun." Which is to say, maybe everything was inside us all along, and this record is about pushing us forward by reminding us all of the untapped power of that most punk-ian spirit: "Why can't I make a garage rock jam like some alt-history Can" (as found on "Entangled Entropy")? It's a powerful lesson about the nature of experimentation, how ideas and scenes evolve organically, and the roles we play (as artist and audience) in exploring music's true scope and power. He's The Doctor in this whole piece, and you better get in the damn phone booth.
7.4/10: You will be transformed.
LIYL: MC5, Neu!, and "cosmic apotheosis."
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