Kelly Kirwan
Sheen Marina have fashioned their own Wonder Emporium with their latest single, "Coda Arms," and its corresponding video created/directed by Kohar Minassian. It's a trippy display of knick-knacks superimposed over translucent backgrounds, whose effects teeter between x-ray and neon-thermal vision. Miniature figurines are the forefront, as palm trees, swirling patterns, and even reptilian close-ups act as their canvas. There are tinfoil-twisted astronauts with a single bloodshot eye connecting neck to shoulders, and tiny statues of tongue-lagging dogs drifting happily across the screen.
In a word, it's weird. In another word, it's enrapturing. There's something in Sheen Marina's sound and hallucinogenic logic that keeps you at ease, as if "Coda Arms" were the guide-posts that staved off a bad trip. The Brooklyn four-piece has a mix of surf rock and slight psych-punk influences, which come together and form an unexpected sound—it's jazzy and lo-fi, with an inviting voice pulsating somewhere beneath the melody.
The song starts off dreamy enough before breaking into a semi-familiar rock structure (but not for long). Sheen Marina flutters between quick lapses into staccato drumming, twisting guitar riffs, and then tapers off into an eerie, warbled pitch you would expect to hear while spotting a UFO. It plays like a pinball machine, your attention in a constant state of flux, but still soothed by the game. It's to be expected from a band that's "in love with everything," and whose style shows it. "Coda Arms" also doubles as their EP title, a trifecta of the uncanny an intriguing—an Emporium worth the ticket purchase.