Regal Degal are coming at you with all they’ve got in 2011. Antwerp-transplant and frontman Josh da Costa even told Impose, “As of November 2010, Regal Degal has increasingly high self-worth.” I would be asking myself what the fuck he meant by that, but in conjunction with their ghetto-fabulous blogspot, their reappropriation of 1960s-era film footage, their annoying pseudonyms, or just their generally flippant Futurist Loki leanings, my guess is that it’s really not that important. Or at least, not as important as their music.
Yanked off the chain of a forthcoming self-released 12”, “Peace On Repeat” is both familiar ground and an utter rarity amongst the cacophony that’s been spewing out Brooklyn for the past several months. Glimmeringly soaked guitar hits echo and repeat insistently over a hand-pounded mechanical drumbeat, leaving space for narrative-oriented pedal flourishes while da Costa’s voice floats detached in and out of the scene, somewhere in between an Ian Curtis or a John Bender. There is also that sneaky bassline that starts tickling you halfway through the chorus, taking you back to a mid-90s R&B groove. da Costa sings, “Looking for a voice while the feedback lingers,” and I get the impression that this type of self-masturbatory record collector conjecture and synthesis is what the Degal is all about.
