This week’s band of the week is a band I discovered in Israel and just really, really liked. The band of the week is…

ROCKFOUR!!!

So yeah, I already blogged about these psychedelic indie rockers this week but now they’re band of the week because I’ve been listening to their album Haolam Hamufla (The Wonderful World) almost non-stop. Amazingly, it’s actually the band’s eight studio album, and they’ve been around since 1988! You’d think they’d be a bunch of old kaukers who don’t know what the kids are hip to these days, but au contrair, the album is very contemporary, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they’d taken notes from Caribou and Grandaddy, while there’s clearly a strong Sgt. Peppers-era Beatles influence, but that’s no surprise. But most importantly, the songs are just damn good – beautifully constructed, aesthetically chiselled, and pretty catchy. Even more surprising is that these guys seem to be some of the most with it of all the bands and musicians I’ve heard in this country. A lot of stuff feels very dated or artificial – I haven’t really found any young, lo-fi rockers (working on it though, I’m sure they’re here).

I haven’t heard much of Rockfour‘s earlier work but some that I have heard is well-written but not quite as aesthetically interesting or definitive. A lot of it also seems to be more in the vein of early, Piper-era Pink Floyd (they actually submitted their cover of “Arnold Lane” in a competition created by David Gilmour in honour of Syd Barrett‘s death and won – a lot of Pink Floyd love in Israel btw, if you’re from Thornhill you understand…) And – as is the case with a lot of Israeli music – the English work feels a bit contrived, as it probably is with the intention of appealing to the International market. Their Hebrew stuff is way better.

I wish I could talk more about the lyrics – I can only understands bit and phrases but on Haolam Hamufla it would appear they sing about some pretty heavy stuff, with song titles like “Ein Lach Elohim” (“We Don’t Have A G-d”) and “Degel” (“Flag”). Not exactly sure what they’re saying about those things though.

Anyways, it’s really good, I highly recommend downloading Haolam Hamufla (The Wonderful World). It may very well be a modern psychedelic masterpiece.

Knoxville, TN chill-gazer/ambient-pop maker Brandon Biando (also of a band called COOLRUNNINGS that I will check out after posting this) makes some very nice music on the track below. Anyone else getting a serious Grandaddy vibe? (Via No Fear Of Pop)