Another solid release from Mono, this time a collaboration with another Tokyo artist by the name of World's End Girlfriend. The music is as good as I expect from Mono, as there’s no departure from the sound they’ve cultivated on previous releases. I would like to see some exploration of their sound but the familiarity is comforting.
Palmless Prayer/Mass Murder Refrain is essentially one large piece split across five long tracks (well it feels like one piece, the two titles would suggest otherwise but it’s hard to tell where one piece would end and the other begins). It is a slow and melancholic piece of music that changes subtly throughout the album. It is the kind of album that I find is best appreciated by giving it full attention on headphones late at night. Like the rest of MONO’s output, it is that slick “soundtrack to a movie where all of civilisation has crumbled and only a few are left to struggle against the elements” sound. One striking thing about this release is that for a collaboration, it sounds remarkably like just MONO on their own. I’ve no idea what world’s end girlfriend add to the album apart from a suitably apocalyptic name.
The first two parts of Palmless Prayer/Mass Murder Refrain are slow, meditative string pieces that explore variations of the same melody. It is a peaceful and relaxing 25 minutes of music, I could quite happily listen to a whole CD of it. However on the third part MONO up the ante and change the direction of the piece, introducing guitar and building the music up slowly into a throbbing… They eventually pull back and return to the style of the first two parts but add piano and voices to the strings. All of the music is intensely sad and it is this tugging of the heart strings that brings MONO up from being a cliché to being a formidable group in their own right.
The fifth and final part of Palmless Prayer/Mass Murder Refrain is the longest, clocking in at nearly twenty minutes. Starting with a similar piano and strings pattern to “Part Four” it builds up with bass, guitar and drums into the closest thing to a happy feeling that MONO have ever produced. Although it is also the weakest part of the album which makes me think that being miserable is far more entertaining than being happy. It does round off the album satisfactorily but it is a little anticlimactic compared to the rest of the album.
While it’s not Mono's finest, it certainly deserves to be on the shelf next to their other albums. Although I must say I still can’t fathom what world’s end girlfriend bring to the table.
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