What's a Listening Log? Well, the idea is quite simple. It's a weekly segment that consolidates all the mini-reviews Dozens Of Donuts has given on RateYourMusic over the past week, split between the Past and Present. A straightforward grading scale has been put in place, ranging from A+ to F-, with C acting as the baseline average. There is no set amount of reviews per week, just however many I get around to reviewing. And don't expect week-of reviews. I wait one month - with at least three listens under my belt - before I rate and review an album. Enjoy!
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1992 | Noise Rock | Listen
NEWCOMERS BURNT OUT BY SELF-IMPOSED ROCK LIMITATIONS
After an exhilarating self-titled EP, which featured Cor-Crane Secret's best song 'Can I Ride,' Polvo comes up with a dud as their debut. This could, once I've listened to the more well-received Today's Active Lifestyles, be a crossroads album trapped between generic Rock platitudes and distant Pop appeal. Here, the Noise Pop element of their EP is reduced so immensely that 'Can I Ride,' with its dreamy vocals and crisp wall of sound, sticks out like a sore thumb whilst compared to the arid tones and familiar patterns of Cor-Crane Secret's other efforts. 'Vibracobra' and 'Well Is Deep' have some melody sensibility, but not enough to make up for the slog of mundane guitar work featured elsewhere. The short, instrumental tracks like 'Ox Scapula' and 'Duped' are totally unnecessary. This LP just oozes forgettability during a time in the early 90's when Rock was inundated with Noise and Indie Rock styles like this.
D
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2017 | Neoclassical Darkwave | Listen
A PIOUS APOSTLE CONVERTS TO NIHILISM WHEN TRAGEDY STRIKES
The genre tags tell you all you need to know: Death Industrial, Neoclassical Darkwave. On All Bitches Die, Lingua Ignota unleashes one of the most vile, excruciating, backbreaking albums of the modern era. So many descriptors could be used, but nothing is better than experiencing the disdain and grief Ignota expels. The duality between each extreme, outright misanthropy and inner accession, drives All Bitches Die and helps keep the listener hypnotized. It's as if, on a personal level, Ignota herself is undergoing a self-imposed exorcism, while ushering in a fiery apocalypse globally.
The distinction between styles benefit each other immensely, as the contemplative lulls give way to extreme convulsions, and vice versa. Nowhere is that seen better than on the magnificent final two tracks; 'For I Am The Light' and 'Holy Is The Name.' One, a ravenous razing that finds Ignota taking the form of Beelzebub amidst Armageddon. "Each breath you draw is mine / Each fingertip is mine / Each strand of hair is mine / And all things begin and end with me" she wails, putting to shame her gothic predecessors Diamanda Galás and, more recently, Chelsea Wolfe. It really feels as if Hell itself is rising from Earth's crust. On the contrary, 'Holy Is The Name' features nothing more than Ignota's brittle vocals and select strings, drawing All Bitches Die inwards to a gorgeous ending that puts into perspective all the torment previous endured. "All my rapists lay beside me / All my rapists cold and grey / Holy is the name of the seeping gash / Holy is the name of my ruthless axe" she pleads with quivering acceptance, ending the violence and agony with soft, tender amity.
All Bitches Die is a triumph of art coalescing with emotion. Couple that with Lingua Ignota's capricious lyrics that essentially turns the biblical Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse into a rallying cry for overcoming abuse, and the harsh production that doesn't discredit harmony through Drone, and you have one HELL of an album.
A
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