4 out of 5

Label: Hydra Head / Double H Noise Industries

Producer: James Plotkin

This is, without a doubt, one of the most fruckin’ technically amazing compositions to which my ears have been exposed, a unique splash of noise and music into an aural assault that refuses to not be listened to.  …To the extent that I couldn’t listen to it when it originally came out, my ears requesting some kind of moment to catch a breath or identify a song and being defeated at every mutation of drummer Witte’s drums morphing into tech-tweaked heart-attacks of percussion or Plotkin’s harsh guitars and PCP-d Primus like bouncing bass suddenly stretching into Aphex Twin BPM nightmares.  I’d think that in time, I’ll recognize it, I’ll find a groove.  But you can’t.  Coming back to this years later, with my ears warmed to more experimental and noise releases thanks to sticking by labels like Hydra Head, or VHF, or Skin Graft, I can enjoy the fuck out of this record with the understanding that you’ve gotta actually listen to it.  If you put it on as background music, you’ll either find yourself with the jitters or wanting to stab your eyes and ears.  It never stops moving, and the combinations of elements is too angular (and the noise aspects in moments too harsh) to sit anywhere but in the forefront – and even then, find yourself misled into headbanging or toe-tapping by that first song, you go right ahead, and then by track 3 or 4 you’ll sit down, just letting it wash over you, exhausted.

But in a good way.  And yes, when you do start to listen to it, the songs do take shape, the way they all start with a hardcore groove and then dissect the shit out of it and tear it apart and up and down and then let it come back for just long enough to remind you it’s still the same track, but it still demands your attention.

Impressive as fuck, and not to be pinpointed as instrumental or hardcore or even experimental, Plotkin’s continual explorations of the meeting between sound and noise can’t help but be slightly hindered by their very nature of never forming central themes or feelings (there is the over-arching sense of just seeing what happens when you juxtapose elements), but if you’re willing to give the album the time, this is MUSIC far beyond the confines of any definition of the word.