Illness in music. Can music be sick? I don’t know of a better way to describe Warmer Milk’s debut LP Radish on Light than to say it caught something; something wrong, something awesomely wrong. The sickly feelings are present from the moment “In The Fields” stumbles on until the hum of the title track’s drone fades out. Instruments grasp in vain for moments of togetherness and they happen spontaneously but only for short periods of time before they collapse and permutate into another thing altogether. This is by all means a “jam” record, but not one to drop out to. The out of tune guitars coalescing, seemingly “off” in terms of tonality, play off one another like an evil Grateful Dead intent on giving their audience a terrible trip.
The “wrong” sound of Radish on Light is it’s most alluring quality. “The Shark” is downright nightmarish despite being the closest thing to a “normal” song on the album — it sounds like the musical equivalent of being chased by a madman. Micheal Turner’s deranged vocals aren’t going to dispel any discomfort you may feel while listening. Warmer Milks maintain their sickly sound throughout the album, with a very brief foray into 60s psychedelic rock meanderings in “Pentagram of Sores” before the droning monolithic title track finishes out the album.
For a group that released a wealth of spectacular material in a very short time span, Radish on Light was the nasty little album that should have been a breakthrough.