Bimbo's 'The Bimbonacci Sequence' Is a Gleefully Unpredictable Masterpiece of Sibling Noise
Bimbo are Gretchen and Dawson McKenzie, a sister-and-brother duo out of Marquette, Michigan, and The Bimbonacci Sequence is their first full-length — eight tracks on Exploding In Sound, catalogue number EIS154. The titles set the tone before a note plays: “Things Keep Getting Worse,” “Chewing Glass,” “Sick Moves,” “I’m Evil Now,” “Jackals,” “Bimbo, USA.”
The Sonic Breakdown
The Production & Mix
The Low-End: Recorded and mixed by Ryan Staples at Dead River Sound, and the room is audible in the best way — the drums sound like a kit in a space rather than a kit in a plugin. There is no bass player, so the guitar has to do two jobs, and the record’s low end comes from how hard Gretchen leans on the bottom strings.
The Spatial Dynamics: Greg Obis mastered at Chicago Mastering Service, and the restraint shows. Nothing here is flattened into loudness; the quiet passages stay quiet, which is what makes the lurches land. For a two-piece this is a surprisingly wide record, and the width is all arrangement rather than overdub piles.
Standout Performance
Gretchen McKenzie’s voice, which has an alarming range of registers and deploys them without warning — a low, deadpan coo one bar and a full-throated shriek the next. Dawson’s drumming is the other half of the trick: the kit is doing the commentary, not just the timekeeping, and on “Sick Moves” the two of them hand the beat back and forth like it’s a dare.
Why It’s Certified
Because it never does the expected thing and never feels random either — a hard combination. Post-Trash’s Kris Handel, reviewing it, wrote that “Bimbo have embraced their full quirk in a truly magical fashion,” and called the album “a delightful puzzle of a record that unfathomably reveals new layers every time you listen.” That second part is the real recommendation. A record this jumpy could be exhausting on a third listen; this one just keeps turning over new sides. Trenton Davis handled the photo and art direction, and the sleeve is as off-kilter as the songs.