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Review

"Verkeerdevlei review"
Max Barashenkov Obrigado magazine

2012

If bulimic cityscapes and arteries clogged with poets and vagrants made love to the desolate veld, the bastard that clawed its way out would be Verkeerdevlei. The Buckfever Underground’s latest offering is one of unusual choices, slipping from spokenword eulogies to urban living and down-to-earth open-road ballads. Toast Coetzer, part-Bukowski, part-Boris Pasternak, guides the cabal with his haunting voice on a search for some kind of gritty South African truth between axe-cut Afrikaans verses, English melodies and lots of cigarettes.

The swingy chanson theme runs through the record, from ‘Klawer’ to ‘Here We Go’, dipping the music into a world of neo-noir parlours, where smoke hangs thick and conversations wander from blunt realities of poverty to meaningful contemplations about the weather. Verkeerdevlei is undoubtedly one of this year’s most interesting local albums.