Nice Biscuit: Create Stimulate – EP review

NICE BISCUIT

Create Stimulate

Believe Digital

Out now

Australian psych band Nice Biscuit further make their mark with the release of the new EP Create Stimulate.

We tipped the band a couple of months back with the release of their track Fem Chem, and it’s that same song that the band kick things off with on their new EP, Create Stimulate. With chanted harmonised vocals and psych guitar that weaves its way out, the band take aim at the culture of toxic masculinity in a playful and engaging way that grips and shimmers through their dense and captivating rhythms. There’s a haunting drone that rides beneath the stabbing organ line that adds to the woozy effect. The dual vocals of frontwomen Billie Star and Grace Cuell glide over the top like sirens pulling you effortlessly into their world.

There’s more of a 60s garage vibe the into to Pink River, leading you to think that it’s going to rocket along, but they soon lift off once again into the popsphere, shimmeringly simple guitar riffs and gentle harmonies again spinning a fine web of sound through which the band transfix and hypnotise. Space Dogs sits in the middle of the EP as a brief instrumental break before they swoop in with the fantastic Candle. Here they groove along on a deeper darker psych, not too far from their contemporaries Slift. The music pulses from within, an urging paranoia that rises up. It’s the highlight of the EP, transfixing throughout. According to the band, mourning the loss of core knowledge destroyed by the killing and oppression of countless women during the burning times. It is a homage to the powerful witch, seeking to reframe the perception of this archetype, from evil sorcerer to revered healer and mother, a song about women regaining their power through collectivism, creativity, and inner work in order to lead us out of patriarchal dominance and into an age of equality.

They sign off the EP with the chugging and driving Limbs, the song whose lyrics provide the collection with its title. “Create, stimulate, there is no escape.” Nor would you want to when the songs are as good as they are here. The EP is hopefully just a taste of what is to come from Nice Biscuits. They released their debut album, Digital Mountain, back in 2018, and hopefully, this EP is a sign that their next full-length is on its way. For now, it’s a great bridge and a morsel that will keep us going until it does.

Create Stimulate is available here.

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Words by Nathan Whittle. Find his Louder Than War archive here.