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Foreign Bodies, "Never Ready"

On ostensibly their first release, Foreign Bodies meshes '90s alternative rock, industrial, and hardcore punk thrash, and filters it all through a lens of Wolf Eyes scum noise (no doubt due to production assistance from Weasel Walter).  Needless to say, much is accomplished across these 10 tracks in 15 minutes.

 

Sound Nutrition

The opening "Colby Contrast" sounds like it could be a lost Sebadoh or Pavement demo someone found in a closet, and then decided to play back with an obscene amount of clipping and distortion.  The overall sound is very much noise, yet it's not hard to hear the conventional rock structure of the track buried among the muck.  "Conduct Case" and "Good Job" follow a similar structure, though with more of a punk edge to them.  Even something vaguely industrial rears its head in "Transistor Radios + the Fuckin' Beeline" in which the drum machine is set to a much faster tempo and, mixed with the noise, could be an EXTREMELY lo-fi take on Land of Rape and Honey  era Ministry. 

Oddly enough, the noise is stripped away on "USS ADD" to allow fort he more musical elements to seep in, which are good enough on their own to not have to always be buried in the noise elements.  The three tracks closing the EP, "Just Talk Talk," "Bachelor," and "Try Again, Punk" are a distinctly noise take on hardcore punk, which is unsurprising from their brief durations.  Imagine someone’s broken boom-box blasting out random selections from the Minor Threat discography and that's a good description.

For a first, limited release, this is a pretty self-assured and focused disc that varies itself enough to not sound as if it is relying on one gimmick too long, and thus is infinitely more interesting than it could have been.