- HTRK's sublime Psychic 9-5 Club was one of the very best albums of 2014. The resulting spike in interest in the Australian duo would likely have ensured brisk business for this EP almost regardless of its content, but in fact there's a lot going on here. First there's the beauty and collectability of the package itself. Belgium's Sleeperhold Publications is a multi-disciplinary publishing platform with a stated aim to release "ten outputs, spanning different realms of the arts, and then cease to exist." Having put out a photobook, a poster set, a deck of cards and short stories before this, they are now in the process of releasing ten vinyl records. As with all of the records Sleeperhold will release, only Body Lotion's A-side has music on it—on the B-side is an etching by London-based artist and longtime HTRK associate David Ferrando Giraut.
Then there's the quality of the music and the line it helps draw to where HTRK are now. Body Lotion collects three tracks from the sessions for the band's 2011 album Work (work, work), and sounds like a reasonably advanced but still rough sketch of Psychic 9-5 Club's grandeur. The majesty of that album's drums and vocals are often present on Body Lotion, but they tend to be accompanied by a thick layer of Robin Guthrie-indebted guitar that the cleaner Psychic 9-5 Club jettisoned. "Sugar" and the title track exemplify this, their wafting guitars surrounding everything in a comforting wash of distortion. "Punch," the subtle background hum of which gives Jonnine Standish's voice more room to breathe, is by far the clearest signpost of where HTRK would be a couple of years down the line.
TracklistA1 Sugar
A2 Punch
A3 Body Lotion