Tracks: 5
Running time: 31.7 Minutes
Chronology from this Artist’s Discography: 1
Purchased: Online via Amie Street Current price 90 cents for album 18 cents per track.
One Sentence Review: The music proves just interesting enough not to throw away, and leaving room for growth.
Celebrity Factor: Unknown – Presume 0
Pretension: 11 of 10 (really, no names? numbers? that’s just silly)
Out and About: podcasts – Radio Orphans, Atlantic Wave, This Reality; Performances – None? possibly Chicago but nothing recent; Press-None
Grade: B-
This is an interesting record it is a little all over the place but in the end it comes back on itself sort of an Ouroboros.
Cover art is quite nice. Some sort of crazy robot or a deep sea diving suit. We feel we are to believe that the music itself is the product of some sort of crazy robot (or robots). this cannot be verified or denied.
So what do we think? lets ponder it a moment. inhale the aroma. move the needle back to the groove. and wait:
Wall of noise. – heard this before it seems pretty standard realistically speaking. not so sure these guys have done a great job on this. But there is something there that i don’t hate.
what the hell is this then? why these damn power chords? growing angry? I see they think that changing time signatures is clever. going to be one of those then. here we go, what I am really wanting at this point (3 minutes in) is a more complete lack of consistancy. triplets not quite triplets repeat. back to powerchords. it is inconsistant but it doens’t embrace it fully. I would be happier I think if it just took it to the extreme… and then they sort of do.
The song is through composed and abandons motifs easily, but every so often a theme points back to an earlier moment. Do we need that? I’m not sure but i think perhaps these guys are spending to much time thinking about it you know? In a way it’s refreshing that so much thought went into that little therimin lick but it teeters on the overwraught.
Gnawing on the first 6 minutes as the last 6 filters in I want to blame something somewhere for me not being swept away with it all. maybe the broom comes later but 6 minutes is a long time to wait. I think it might roll down to that rhytm section, the bass is doing a lot but perhaps it should be more focused on holding things in place.
When we move up here at 8 minutes I’m more than ready for the noise, it could have gone on forever but there is a coda there. again with the bass high and prominent (guys you can be honest and tell him to sit down a bit really) the thing really shines when the violin gets some attention though. i think it’s a contrast thing but more contrast would have been better move the tempo down too.
ok i liked it. are you happy? the second track there? loved it dense, noisy, composed… shorter than I would like I think
Third track comes out of the noise well, good bridge, more engaging than the first track (maybe we should have changed the order kids) more violin up front, dense and chordy, enough vamping to make sense, enough variation to entice. while it still feels thought out it feels more organicly done, less manufactured. do you do sciscor kicks during that heavily rockist section? i think you should. it sounds like that violin is being played with a whole dead cat.
see this is what I like. your chords and sections repeat and the bass holds it down but the violin, therimin and guitar go with a row row row your boat thing. and then it all lines up at the end. more please.
this is a great song guys. write more like this. and when you devolve into noise this is the noise I want. see how it is dense and has a solid stream to follow but at any moment I could get lost in half a dozen elements go back and listen again and a new path opens up? this is what noise should be about the listener finds their own way through it. lovely
back to songs again and nary a seem in sight. but this is four four if ever i have heard such a thing. and unabashedly rockist. but damn it it’s good. and when the violin is on it’s own i feel my heart beating and I want it to go on and on and it does and when it is to much to bear it comes crashing down just exactly as it should.
the tempo changes not due to inertia or pretense here but from exhaustion it is as if we had a big fight and can no longer hold our rage. we know it’s over though we can feel it and we say our final goodbyes and part abruptly and finaly with silence. until we move the needle back to the groove and wait.
So that’s it, we listened to this not once or twice but in it’s entirety three times on end. if they are robots they can certainly speak as if they are human even though they don’t deign to speak except through the samples they select (but serriously guys… poltergeist samples? c’mon. we get the name already.) I’ve never felt thrown out of an album before but this one does that to me only to find me coming back round asking for more of the same.
this is not the start of a healthy relationship.
i fear that these guys are already a vanished band. but i would love to hear more from them.