AMG Review of Lucy In the Sky With DNA Helixes

Ned Raggett
All Music Guide

A fine five-song effort, Lucy in the Sky With DNA Helixes features a Minmae lineup, with Brooks accompanied by Daniel Power on bass and Arabella Makalani on drums here and there. The extended opening song "Passed Out Returning From Someplace Else I Dreampt This" is a standout; a steady head-nodder of a tune somewhere between post-psych drug rock and post-punk doom, with a nicely trebly guitar solo from Brooks in the middle of things. The Krautrock-tinged chime and chug of "Sword/Stone" is another, mixing motorik with ragged but right indie rock in the post-Dinosaur Jr. vein to create a serene end result. The remaining songs all have their high points, including the wracked drawl and scream of Brooks on the slow, just punishing enough "All Notes Ghostnotes," breaking into a suddenly beautiful-and-blissed section at the end, and the calmer, more gently unsettled "Let Boredom Have the Dance."