Album Review: Xiu Xiu – 13″ Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips

Xiu Xiu, an experimental rock group formed in 2002, was started by its sole continuous member, Jamie Stewart. The band was formed in San Jose, CA after Stewart’s previous group, Ten in the Swear Jar, had disbanded. Since its inception over twenty years ago, Xiu Xiu has consistently produced music for those in search of the peculiar and original.

Now the band is back yet again with a release that is guaranteed to sound like nothing one would hear in a commercial or on the radio. 13″ Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips was released to all platforms on September 27, 2024.

This is a compact album, managing to explore multiple genres in under 40 minutes. Listeners can expect to find all of the common elements of a modern experimental project. Backgrounds of white noise, spoken word vocals, a litany of ambient synths, and abrupt dynamic changes. However, there is more to this album. It allows itself to have fun amidst the seriousness of the tone in lyrics and sound. Moreover, the apparent vocal influences of singers like Leonard Cohen and David Bowie shine through and mystify the supporting instrumentals.

This vocal approach can immediately be heard in the album’s opening track, “Arp Omni.” An orchestral intro gently leads the song into the poetic stylings of the vocalist. This track is heavily juxtaposed in tone and style to the next on the album, “Maestro One Chord,” which starts with aggressively 90s lo-fi drums. A drum track that sounds like it might be heard in the ad bumps of “Adult Swim.” This is to say that there is a certain nostalgia in the percussion. The vocals on this track are also reminiscent of the style of 90s alternative bands like “Beck” and “Butthole Surfers.”

Further along in the album, listeners will be welcomed to sharp, distorted guitar riffs, operatic organs, and pulsating synths. Dynamically, the album’s second half features aggressive lines of attack that are met with laidback counterpoints. Overall, there are a multitude of musical influences that must have been pulled from to produce such a record. Fans of anything with a dark tone will find a lot to enjoy in 13the ” Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips. It is an audacious record that is overall successful in its execution.