If you happen to be in the mood for a pigeon-themed post-punk record, you could do a lot worse than having a flutter on Bird Brain Gang. Like an ornithophilic Ramones, the trio consist of Phil Pigeon, Jimmy Pigeon and Tommy Pigeon and they are sure to ruffle a few feathers by dropping this debut.
Unlikely to be going cheep, the impeckable LP sounds a bit like Delia Derbyshire remixing a collaboration between (Bird Brain) Gang Of Four, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion and The Residents. It’s a veritable coo d’état, in fact, guaranteed to secure The Pigeons’ position right at the top of the perch of wonky avian synth-rock.
For the uninitiated, the fourth song provides a brief history of pigeon-made rock music from its origins in the early 1960s. The references to human music’s rich past will not fly over the heads of eagle-eared listeners either, from The Pigeons’ answer to Black Sabbath on ‘Iron Bird’ to a confrontational channelling of The Birthday Party during ‘Take Aim’, when Phil Pigeon promises to release not the bats but his fellow feathered friends, thereby instigating a napalm strike of guano over London’s hapless population of pitiful people.
Taking a more harmonious view, ‘Amanda Fielding’ is sung from the doting perspective of the literal love bird (her pet pigeon) with whom the LSD researcher and trepanning advocate claims to have shared a passionate emotional relationship.
On a semi-serious note Bird Brain Gang, rumoured to be master-minded by Philip “Man From Uranus” Baerwalde, is partly inspired by the changing mood and shape of London, with the attempts to drive and keep the pigeons away from Trafalgar Square acting as an allegory for the more general gentrification which over the years has transformed the capital from a vibrant and colourful place into the dreary property-developed playground of poshos and oligarchs it is today. Look into the beady eyes of the city’s pigeon population and you’ll notice that they’ve seen some things, those scrap-pecking natives.
Ironically, The Pigeons are resistant any kind of pigeon-holing and Bird Brain Gang really promises to put a cat among the pigeons. Or some pigeons among the fat cats? The point is that this record is such a bizarre, funny and unique experience that even listeners who prefer different species of birds will be raven about it.
