Since Radio Birdman’s Deniz Tek (swirling dervish guitarist supreme) and Rob Younger (slurred and loosely swaggerin’ vocalist) are both eager participants in Deep Reduction, an expectant array of comparisons will inevitably be made between the two bands. And while I’m an admittedly proud Radio Birdman freak, I can honestly say that Deep Reduction are just as sonically spectacular as the legendary Birdmen (if not more so!), and this is certainly rowdier, crunchier, trippier, and more disruptively brazen in spots than some of Deniz and Rob’s earlier auditory output. Indeed, this is ballsy and blistering tavern-stomp rock’n’roll with a certain hard-edged and high-spirited jammin’-in-the-garage feel to it. The songs are dangerously curvaceous like the sharp, angular bends of a narrow and twisting mountain road or the sleek well-rounded physique of a fleshpot pin-up goddess. The instrumentation is masterfully precise, yet as casually shaped as ghostlike shrouds of cigarette smoke seductively straddling the heavy humid air of a cram-packed jukejoint on a Saturday night in June. Downright unbelievably intoxicating, this is! And you can bet that I like it more than bees like makin’ honey.
–Roger Moser Jr. (Get Hip)