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21 year old Olafur Arnalds wrote some of this debut when he was 15. His controlled pieces for piano, strings, and occasional electronics will have fans of Max Richter and Johann Johannsson as happy as dreaming dogs having their bellies tickled.
Arnalds is from Iceland and the stereotypical reaction might be to suggest his work is clean, cool and somehow emotionally detached. In interviews about his creativity, though, he has largely played down the influence of native landscape, preferring instead to speak of the effects of interactions with real people and of life in his hometown. Certainly Eulogy for Evolution seems a structured reflection of a passage of time such as that of a human lifespan and Arnalds’ music engages emotions immediately and does not let them go. He achieves this by sound alone as the titles of tracks are depicted by numbers rather than through the use of phrases or names. These numbers apparently allude to the timing of imaginary snapshots throughout the album. Hence “3326” refers to a possible picture of the scene at 33 minutes 26 seconds. Opener “0040” features crystal piano notes framed and seemingly held in the air by the plainest of string arrangements. “0048/0729” is an exercise in delay and restraint with added atmospherics and (perhaps) accordion, with quite epic results.
Parts of “1440” are almost too lush for my tastes but stop just about shy of full-on sentimentality. I also like the fake ending on this piece and the ending which is a repetition of just a few notes. The important thing is: they are the right notes. Calling your record Eulogy for Evolution shows a certain confidence but Arnalds has the talent to match and critics have murmured like contented lambs suckling on their mother’s milk. While the rules of composition were ripped up decades ago it’s a trifle hard not to feel something approaching negativity when someone so young combines melancholy and optimism with so little fuss: almost as if he should have to do a longer apprenticeship if only to acknowledge that evolution takes time. No matter, Arnalds has studied Arvo Part and has been chosen to tour with Sigur Ros later this summer so his gravitation toward sparse impressionism is probably a natural path.
In any event his debut sounds full of the reverence and awe normally reserved for God, or at least George Best or Sir Vivian Richards at the absolute peak of their powers. As exquisite as the first few tracks are, by “1953” I was thinking that evolution (in alphabetical terms) would only be progressing from about A to H. However, on the gorgeous but more dramatic and nuanced “3055” a dynamic of change is writ in fuzzed electronics, speedy piano and booming percussion. “3326,” the shortest piece on the album, adds to the variety with a quasi-violent rubbing of strings evoking the brief passion of Jacqueline du Pre: chopped down before she was barely a woman.
I once upset the host of a party by changing the music after what was starting to seem like 48 hours of lute music. Unbeknownst to me, she had set up a series of tapes to gradually delight the ears of her guests with a timeline of sound encompassing early music right through to (what was then the happening sound of) Eno and Byrne! Let me offer belated apologies to the host, Melanie. In my defense, party goers were impatient and, as with evolution itself, unable to predict when, or if, swift and radical changes would ever occur. Olafur Arnalds has not released an album encompassing the entire history of Western music, but Eulogy for Evolution will reward the patient listener.
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Released in both CD and 12” vinyl formats, with five bonus cuts on the CD, Dream Island Laughing Language has a happy homemade intensity blending sounds gleaned from natural instruments such as bells, bowls, flutes, mini- dulcimer, mbira, hands, rubber bands and...rocks, as well as those derived from cassettes and computers.
Lucky Dragons' symbolic band name (named after a Japanese fishing boat that became a symbol of anti-nuclear feeling after it was snagged in the fallout of a US hydrogen bomb test), their pseudo digital ragas and electro-acoustic mandalas, their slacker looks and preposterous promo blurb lead me to the inescapable conclusion that... here's a band to get behind. This is their eighteenth release since the spring of 2000. The “dream island” part of the album title refers to the landfill in Tokyo harbor where the boat now resides and the “laughing language” bit harks toward the idea that some things cannot be expressed in our own languages.
Starting with the self-explanatory “Clipped Gongs” Dream Island has enough contrast in pacing and texture to hold the shortest of attention spans. Luke Fischbeck is the hinge on which the whole Lucky Dragons project swings. He also sings a little in nicely resonant tones. Indeed, on “Drinking Dirty Water” his singing has the calm appeal of Brian Eno’s pastoral pastel period. “Desert Rose” is an addictive piece of frenetic yet spacious percussion. “Starter Culture” sounds stretched and ethereal and rather like how I imagine weasels with rain sticks might interpret Animal Collective. A live performance by Lucky Dragons might be something to see (and maybe participate in). Things continue in this flashy vein until the opening section of final track “Very 2,” which shows how the group can use a more full sound as a means to progress.
Dream Island Laughing Language is a pretty convincing record, albeit one that with a fairly narrow appeal. There remains the nagging doubt about Fischbeck and Sarah Rara's claim that they play “poppies” although that may be another reason to support them.
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With a track record collaborating with the likes of Sunn O))), Thorr’s Hammer, and other dark luminaries, the sound of this disc is not at all unexpected. However, while her collaborations strayed more towards the metal end of things, this first (and entirely solo) disc is decidedly more eclectic, and for that reason perhaps more frightening than any of her other appearances.
The disc is front loaded with the more jarring and frightening moments. It opens extremely frightening and, while not letting up, begins to lessen the demonic grab by the end of the disc. Opening track “Collapse-Lifting of the Veil” sounds like a demonic possession must feel. The piece is a constant battle between fragmented stabbing noisy guitar drone and gentle, acoustic strumming, just as the vocals alternate between soft folk singing and deranged, Linda Blair growls and shrieks. The follower, “Expanding Universe,” has a similar template, but of a more electronic flavor with synthetic noises and a split between ambient passages and harsh electronic noise outbursts.
Other tracks during the first half follow this disorienting mix of the beautiful and the beastly. Guitar noise, indecipherable noises, gentle vocals and spoken word elements balanced with growled, inhuman vocals, sometimes pure, other times electronically treated to be even less human.
“Incubation” and “Birth” both mark a slightly less terrifying turn of events…a deep heartbeat like pulse and calmer more restrained vocals, often pitch shifted to various levels make for a slightly lighter shade of black. I say this because the tracks still have a power electronics style synth drone, and “Love” is based over an awkward nauseating rhythm, and the acoustic guitar elements are occasionally interrupted by jarring blasts of distorted noise.
The unexpected blasts come in the form of violent, tortured screams on “Dying”, appropriately enough, which even upstage the noise blasts that punctuate the guitar drone. The final piece, “Void: Empty Spaces Between Filaments” ends in a restrained, but sinister way: layered vocals that are evil sounding and also relatively restrained, at some points the spoken word parts are even, thrillingly enough, reading physics equations.
As a whole, Amplicon is one of the most schizophrenic releases I’ve heard this year. There are elements of folk, black metal, and pure noise in here, and with its overall cut-and-paste structure, one element is just as likely to pop out as the next. It’s jarring, frightening, and tenser than any horror film I’ve seen in the past few years.
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Never a band to stagnate, Wire have consistently reinvented themselves with each and every release in their long career. This new disc puts them in an interesting situation, given that they have been reduced to a trio with the departure of guitarist Bruce Gilbert. This is a similar situation to the post-Manscape era, when Robert Grey (then Gotobed) left the band. That time, however, they became Wir and released material that, while sharing parallels to Wire, had a different feel entirely. In some ways, perhaps they should have done something similar with this album because, though it is a wonderful work with few shortcomings, it doesn't FEEL quite like Wire.
Back when they were Wir for The First Letter and Vien, it felt like a different beast entirely. Although they had been increasingly flirting with electronic instrumentation and programming, these two works were built most heavily on that. Both of them also took a couple listens to grow on me, while most of the quartet form of Wire’s work was instantly loved. Object 47 has been the same for me, as when I first heard it I definitely had mixed feelings. While a couple tracks stood out immediately as brilliant, others felt a bit out of character for the band. As a whole, it felt just a bit too “pop.” Not that Wire would ever shy away from making pop music—one only has to hear “Map Ref 41°N 93°W” or “Eardrum Buzz” to know that’s not the case—but material like that usually had a more difficult, edgy counterpoint to balance. For an album with “Mr. Marx’s Table” there was a “99.9” to just keep things a bit out of the norm. That is not the case here.
It continues the sonic trend that Read and Burn 03 started late last year, sort of the modernized A Bell Is A Cup to compliment Send’s updated Pink Flag digital thrash. There is a floaty, ethereal feel to a lot of these tracks that characterized much of their 1980s output. But, even on the EP, which was also sans Gilbert, there was the near-10 minute “23 Years Too Late” that kept things a bit enjoyably obtuse. Object 47 consists of nine tracks that all clock in at an average of four minutes. Not really overly oblique or difficult at all.
I do not want to come across as sounding overly critical though, because the album as a whole is most definitely brilliant and worthy of multiple listens, it’s just “different.” The opener “One Of Us,” which was released earlier this year as a free MP3 download, is an earworm slab of pop genius. Bolstered by a rhythm section that was most likely inspired by the DFA folks, it chugs along on a sharp neo-disco beat and a distorted bass line, with a chorus that is as catchy and memorable as any the band has produced in their 31 year career.
Graham Lewis’ increased vocal presence compared to Send is also greatly appreciated, and does give the disc a more Wire feel than it probably would without him. His swarthy delivery of the questions that make up the lyrics of “Are You Ready?” definitely recall the classic “Ambitious” from many albums ago. “Four Long Years” even gives a subtle nod to the Wir era, a mid-paced electronic based piece that feels more than a bit danceable. The album closer “All Fours” is the closest concession to difficult that the disc makes, its darker tone and angry Colin Newman vocals put it a bit more towards the Send side of the spectrum, a bit more raw than the preceding lighter material, but it’s no “Crazy About Love.”
Object 47 is a great pop album. It makes no concessions to the mainstream and is quite obviously the product of Colin Newman, Graham Lewis, and Robert Grey. However, it is pretty clear that the guy who was keen to throw the monkey wrench in a few tracks and increase the esotericness that was always enjoyable was Bruce Gilbert, who is no longer here (in the band, at least). It is an enjoyable disc that I have appreciated more and more with each listen, but the “feel” is just so different than most of the Wire discography. Perhaps it should have been released as Wie or Wre or Ire, but obviously none of those monikers make sense or look good on paper. With any other band I’d probably consider this one of the “Album of the Year” contenders, but given its context, I can’t make that statement, yet at least.
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TINTA INVISIBLE
new sound-fiction by Nad Spiro
GEOMETRIK RECORDS - GR DIGI-03
Nad Spiro (Rosa Arruti), fetish artist on the Spanish experimental music scene, is back with her third solo offering. In Tinta Invisible she goes one step further stretching the sonic reach of her guitar and exploring unfrequented audioZones, using what she calls 'sound camouflage', not shy of employing her voice either. With her we discover new magnetizing horizons in the outer peripheries of electronica pulsing with deeply narcotic cadences.
Possibly the least obscure of her three outings to date, in it Spiro plays further with evocations and shadows to create her 'Sound-Fictions': her musical riddles lean more toward movies by David Lynch or stories by Philip K. Dick. Perhaps what these seductive, indecipherable messages we hear really are is internal communications.
As we have come to expect from Nad Spiro, Tinta Invisible beggars label or description. It was co-produced by Victor Sol, and includes a special collaboration from Kim Cascone.
Tracklisting:
Ex Limbo Stars
Interruptus
Meremont Hotel
Helix
Tinta invisible
Time track
Soundhouse
Obauba
Miss Rotula
Eye TV
Rosa Arruti : limbo guitar, software and voice
Special limited edition released on http://www.geometrikrecords.com/fichacd_i.php3?ID=95
MP3 excerpts : http://www.rotordiscos.com/listadiscos.php?searcha=NAD%20SPIRO
available now through SOLEILMOON
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together with Faust, Nurse With Wound, DACH, Manami N, Incite... www.avantgardefestival.de
http://spiro.mess-age.com
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Car Alarm, The Sea and Cake’s seventh full-length record, is bracing, like the surge of wasabi on sweet sushi, like the slap of cool water on a diving body, like the head-rush of a rollercoaster just leaving summit.
Historically, The Sea and Cake have stayed the course since forming in Chicago in 1993, but over the last couple of years they have pulled in even tighter, recording hot and fast on the heels of a busy performance schedule without breaking for other projects. The sense of trust and communication that is key to a working band is cultivated over the long haul. Stop working together, and those connections go dormant, hibernate; keep on trucking, and they deepen and get sharper, allowing the band to reach for new things, experiment freely, evolve and develop and grow.
The Sea and Cake's aim in creating Car Alarm was to follow up quickly on its precursor, the stripped down Everybody. Sam Prekop says the band wanted to make a record that felt like they had never stopped playing, a continuously limbered up ensemble that parlayed its last tour into new material. They started working on it right after an Australian tour in March, and finished it after a miraculous three-month gestation. If the usual process in pop music is to make a record and then breathe life into it on the road, this flips that presumption on its head, starting with a vital, pulsing set-list on disc; what heights they’ll take the new songs to in concert only remains to be seen.
Where in the past, The Sea and Cake has disbursed between records to allow each member their individual pursuits – Sam Prekop and Archer Prewitt’s artwork and solo projects, John McEntire’s production at his SOMA Studio and work with Tortoise, Eric Claridge’s alternate identity as a painter – in this case they didn’t disband, but dove straight into Car Alarm. The quickness reflects a personal urgency, too, given the imminent delivery of Prekop’s firstborn. Thoughts of fatherhood may lend a kind of optimistic air to the record. It has the open, crisp sound that The Sea and Cake have spent 15 years crafting, but Car Alarm also has a palpable edge. That’s the edge of people who know each other well enough to push a bit harder, who aren’t worried about ruffling each other’s feathers or trying something different, difficult, intuitive, trusting. Something bracing.
-- John Corbett
Car Alarm will be released October 21st on Thrill Jockey.
Tracklisting:
01. Aerial
02. a Fuller Moon
03. on a Letter
04. CMS Sequence
05. Car Alarm
06. Weekend
07. New Schools
08. Window Sills
09. Down in the City
10. Pages
11. the Staircase
12. Mirrors
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There has always been a somewhat contentious, but notable relationship between conventional “pop” music and the more abrasive spectrum of the harsh and electronic. Throbbing Gristle were never hesitant to put a soft gem out like “United” or “Distant Dreams” alongside dissonance like “Subhuman.” More obscure, but more jarring to yours truly was hearing Japanese noise gods Hijokaidan sneaking a faithful cover of Hawkwind’s “Silver Machine” on their Tapes album. Recently there’s folks like Fuck Buttons and Wolf Eyes who are more than happy to mix it with dance and punk, respectively. Dino Felipe (Fukktron, Old Bombs), on the other hand, takes a more literal approach and instead creates a purely pop album with a decidedly noise aesthetic.
Felipe covers a wide variety of what all meets the rather broad requirements for pop music across these 14 tracks. Regardless of the intention, all of the songs come across as covered in some thick grimy coating that can only come from equipment used to make the ugliest sounds for too many years. Not exactly harsh or noise based, but the intentionally murky production is there. A lot of this comes out on top of the vocals, but even the obtuse filtering and layering cannot hide the 60s girl group influenced falsetto vocals on “Stuck on You” and “Willow Waly.”
1980s pop gets a nod too, both on the cover of Haunted House’s “Chandeliers” and “What’s Wrong With Me?” The former’s early synth and electronic piano led melodies provide an odd counterpoint for the harsher vocals, but somehow the two work. The latter is purely a product of that era’s technology and sensibility: a cheap Casio beatbox, noise guitar, and a synth line right out of a Rick James album. Even the 1950s is represented in “Been Waiting” though it feels less Buddy Holly and more Alan Vega/Martin Rev with its abrasive elements.
The other tracks, while they may lack as specific of a temporal reference point are no less enjoyable or catchy. Tracks like “6 Feet Under” have that naïve, bedroom rock charm that early Ween albums exuded before they decided to take themselves more seriously. “Just Call Me” and “I Don’t Want To” throw a bit of punk into the equation, but more in a faster beat and slightly more aggressive approach to both the guitar and the vocals, but never straying from the simple and catchy nature of the tracks.
The No Fun Productions label seems like an odd place for this strange little disc to rear its head, considering it is a label much more known for promoting the harsher and more violent ends of the spectrum. Given the leaning towards pop filtered through a noise lens, it’s not entirely bizarre, but it admittedly is much more conventional than I would have expected, even for all its idiosyncrasies.
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This is the companion piece to the live collaborations I previously reviewed here, however this has the artists collaborating in a studio setting as opposed to a live one. Considering the nature of improvisations, the differences between the two settings are relatively minimal. Recorded during the same period as the Live One disc, the sounds here are, interesting enough, a bit darker, more harsh and dissonant than the improvisations in the live setting.
The raw, bass drones that open the first of the untitled tracks sets this mood early—later met with tightly controlled feedback from Michael Bullock, and other electronics, I’m assuming from Vic Rawlings—resemble an orchestra of power tools tuning up. The second piece as well stays in this rawer territory with its undulating analog noise rhythm and crashing percussion section of random objects being thrown about. Amongst all of this is some of the most pained, abused sounding trumpet playing courtesy of Mazen Kerbaj that I have ever heard on record.
The fourth untitled track, clocking in at over 20 minutes, is one of the more sparse, open tracks in this set. It is a track built more upon subtle electronics and frozen drones instead of the harsher, piercing elements of other tracks. With the exception of some rough bass string scraping, the track stays more in the spacious end of the spectrum. The closing track, also among the longer, is more into the realms of noise, with the sound of strings stretching and distant warbling electronics that are amplified in intensity by wheezing trumpet and the pulsating industrial noise.
The third and fifth pieces begin to cross that threshold from improvisation into much noisier territories. The former sounds like a dying robot: inorganic sounds throughout mixed with blasts of feedback and metal knocking percussion before all coming down into a crashing cacophony of ramshackle noise. The fifth piece is a bit more restrained in comparison, but includes feedback tones, improvised percussion and piercing mid-range electronic noise, that, in all honesty, would not be completely out of place as part of a Merzbow work. The stunted contrabass moments keep the harsher electronic moments more grounded in an organic base.
Although it would usually be expected that studio-based improvisations would be more restrained when compared to live ones, the inverse seems to be the case here. Neither is superior to the other and both represent differing sides to the same coin: a trio that improvise with each other just as well as any of the classic masters of jazz.
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Tzolk’in, as well as being the term given to the 260-day Mayan calendar system, also happens to be the name chosen to encapsulate the collaborative tribal industrial project instigated by Nicolas van Meirhaeghe of Empusae and Gwenn Trémorin of Flint Glass. Haab is their second album, following on from their self-titled 2004 debut on Divine Comedy, and the eight tracks of dark ambient and industrial inflected dance exhibited here project us into a long-lost and forgotten world of irrecoverable mystery, edged with sharply-bladed sinister undercurrents and spine-tinglingly brooding rainforest atmospheres.
It’s an exotic concoction indeed, combining as it does primal rhythms that spear their way directly to the primitive heart of mankind’s brain, creating a delicious friction between the base appeal of something quite untainted, untamed, and raw, and the fear of the alien and unknown elicited by the same. Even those not entirely aware of the significance of the band name, as well as the album and track titles, would still take from it a glimpse into a world of danger, primitive instincts, and precarious existences lived out against a wild—if brightly-tinted and draped—backdrop, where garish flashes of primary colors burst out amongst the dark leafy greens and woodiness, as if to say that appearances here are deceptive; despite the peacock finery of the some of the creatures here (both animal and human) alongside them comes brutality and unalloyed cruelty. Welcome, indeed, to the heady world of Tzolk’in.
Despite the fact that most of the sounds here are digitally generated, allied to breathy voicings and whisperings in addition to the sounds of alien life, there is an undeniable natural feel to everything, that the emotions and the shivers that freely flow up and down the spine are the result of extracts from the real world, that somehow Tzolk’in have been able to reach back through history and forcibly wrench huge chunks of jungle and historical authenticity into the light of modern scrutiny. Perhaps the premier epitomisation of that comes in the form of the track called “Sotz”, flowing from the deep bass rumblings, breathiness and mournful howlings of unseen and unidentified forest-dwellers, to the loping percussive pattern that eventually breaks out into a heavy rhythmic-industrial engine that impels the whole on a headlong rush, carrying the listener crashing through the undergrowth and greenery. All the while, allied to this, there’s a distinct feeling that this wild careening is a running away, that something massive and generally inimical to the personal health of humanity has got its hungry sights set on the audience.
One of the greatest, and most remarkable, assets about this production was its innate ability to place me right in the middle of the action. I did indeed feel as if I was there, wherever ‘there’ is meant to be, and that I was completely wrapped in an environment constructed from sound and rhythm. Alongside the aforementioned “Sotz,” mention must also be made of “Yaxk’in,” an equally dramatic piece dripping, literally, with hidden disembodied beasties, twilight-garbed forests, and a deeply embedded sense of unseen menace, all propelled along with a meatily gargantuan beat, the very dark heartbeat of the jungle itself. Ensuing from here, and just to round things off, is “Xul,” the brooding intelligence of the rainforest made tangible, a slow circular croaking supported by layers of tribal percussion, moving it forward and giving it substantial weight and menace, pinning us hypnotically in its thousand-yard stare.
Without any doubt, this is one of the better, in addition to being one of the more coherent, amalgams of dark ambient atmospheres, rhythmic and tribal industrial, and intelligent dance music to come my way – the sinister and dark atmospheres are admirably sustained throughout and do so without any let-up – and furthermore each track can be recommended as being of equal quality and interest, with not a duff note between them. Personally, I tend to find that such music generally blurs into one homogeneous whole after a while; and even though there's a definite and discernible aesthetic flavoring these pieces, Tzolk'in introduce enough range and variety to sharpen my attention to stop it from wandering. In other words then, I couldn't have done better than to just sit back and let the liana- and vine-encrusted mystery that is Tzolk’in completely enfold me in its leafy and darkly primitive embrace.
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The duo of Charles Wyatt and Jared Matt Greenberg, working under the name of Charles Atlas, have been creating quiet introspective music for ten years now that even in its own tight orbit manages to sparkle and shine with a magical vibrant urgency, and unapologetically exists in a time and place all of its own, without reference it seems to the rest of the world. Social Studies is an 11 track primer to their recorded work over that time span, showcasing the delicately brittle emotional introversion that characterises their music of crystal clarity and diamantine dazzle.
Here are sound-paintings of a mythical, lost America almost, an America portrayed by literature, cinema, and the popular imagination. Guided by glassine guitar and shivering keys aided by mournful strings, soulful brass, and assorted other instruments, Charles Atlas pull us into their world of multifarious moods, of pained romanticism and muted colors, of driving on lonely stretches of desert highway bisecting washed out empty landscapes, of nights spent alone in isolated hotels and drinking in smoky midnight bars, and of endlessly sunny days. These are compositions of ordinary lives lived in small ways, of insignificant but meaningful moments celebrated, of tragedies and triumphs marked—all the tiny moments of life that somehow get swamped by the bigger events but are just as important in sculpting the shape of a person’s journey from birth to death. It is these intimacies of unknown lives and people (but which yet echo our own) that Charles Atlas highlights, shining a torch on sorrows and happinesses alike, bringing the small details into razor sharp relief.
The songs, like most lives in this imagined reflection of the real world, slowly unfold, taking time to reveal their stories and narratives, coaxing shyness and reticence out of their protective shells and giving them their moment in the sun. Shimmering electric piano on opener “Chapultepec” for instance intertwines with strummed acoustic guitar and a subtle latin beat, an exotic little number that breathes a superficially sunny disposition but which hides a melancholia which seeps through in the subtlest of ways. “The Snow Before Us” is perhaps my favorite track on here: mandolin delightfully weaving in and out of strummed and plucked acoustic guitar; the instruments seeming to swoop around and chase each other like two swallows cavorting in the air. This is probably one of the brightest compositions on here, broadcasting a quiet unspoken confidence that all is well with the world. Contrastingly, along comes a track like “The Deadest Bar,” a startlingly beautiful slow-burning 12 minute long drone and guitar track that successfully evokes a lonely 3 in the morning vibe, where the only customers in the bar are the loners and drifters, the itinerants, and the haggard worn-out whores who are desperately still trying to turn a trick, but only managing to drink themselves into a running-mascara stupor instead. Similarly, “Neither/Nor” carries a melodica and string-fuelled downbeat melancholic feel to it, a perfect evocation of sitting on a bed in some godforsaken bedside lamp-lit roadside motel room, a short rest-stop while running away on the road between somewhere and nowhere.
It’s good to know that people are still wrenching affecting emotion and atmospheres from traditional instruments like strings, horns, melodicas, pianos, and guitars, and that there is still a place for craft and musicianship. Make no mistake about it, each of the 11 pieces proffered to us here have been carefully crafted and constructed, and given due consideration as to how best to illuminate each story and tale being told. The overall effect is to bestow a spotlight on the unremarkable minutiae of the everyday and elevate it into something entirely special and enlightening. That, to me, is what epitomises the music of Charles Atlas.
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With a more than slight line up change (the swapping of their current drummer for their old drummer and the addition of the inimitable Joe Preston on bass), Athens’ finest are back with a new album. Although not their strongest to date, they continue to walk a unique path in the world of metal with perhaps only the Melvins meeting them at the odd intersection.
“Death Goes to the Winner” has it all; it starts with a delicate Christmas-themed ballad and then explodes into a mesmerising rock out before boiling down into a soupy, sludgy chug with The Velvet Underground and The Beatles being assimilated and mutated.After starting so strong, the rest of Life... The Best Game in Town doesn't quite reach the same levels of excitement but that is not to say that it isn't a solid album. The riffs are huge and the songs are pummelling, each drum beat almost starts a tectonic movement (drummer Kyle Spence must play with sledge hammers and have arms like tree trunks). It is a picky person who would ask for more.
Yet about halfway through this album it all gets a little samey. Songs like “Decades” and “A Maelstrom of Bad Decisions” bookend a decisively Harvey Milk-by-numbers middle section. The music is good (see my above description) and I cannot pick out any particular flaws but it feels like they could push themselves further. At times they seem to be just running off the same ideas that have fuelled their previous album, Special Wishes, without ever climbing to the same dizzying heights. Although this is nothing new to Harvey Milk, after their classic Courtesy and Goodwill to All Men they released The Pleaser, a less than classic album in my view. So maybe every second album will be a bruiser so whatever comes next (if there is a next) will crush like no other.
The band’s humor is still present: the album’s closer “Good Bye Blues” finishes most unexpectedly with the Looney Tunes theme tune. Along with the bizarre picture on the CD itself (a photo of person with the hole in the CD over the person’s face) keep Harvey Milk apart from the super serious bands that may sound a bit similar. This funny streak is perfectly in keeping with Preston joining the band, a man well known to mix the heavy with the strange.
So while this may not be their best effort, Life... The Best Game in Town is classic Harvey Milk. Long time fans will enjoy it and hopefully thanks to it being on the relatively high profile Hydra Head Records, it will deservingly introduce the band to a wider audience.
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