3 out of 5
Label: Public Bath
Produced by: Steve Albini, Z.G.
Set your mind back to 1991, when Zeni Geva’s brand of transgressive metal was a brand: the repetition and frank crassness of the lyrics was the point; the relative anti-musicness of it was the point. When you get into music of that nature, it can be harder to assess it from an enjoyability standpoint, as maybe the evaluation should include the “artistic” intent as well, as whether or not it was achieved. Z.G. was always a bit of a hard sell on that front, for me, because it felt like the point was made pretty early on (and arguably best / better, when there was more of a chaotic element to it), and there was a stretch after they kicked off – approximately once we get into the 90s, which includes this first recording with Steve Albini, Total Castration – where the group / KK Null was figuring out how to evolve the sound beyond screaming obscenities over repeated guitar grinds.
But, back to ’91, and as a US listener, it’s likely this was one of your first Z.G. listens, thanks to Albini’s presence or it appearing on Public Bath alongside other Japanese noiserockers like Boredoms; even if you had been there from the start, access to music was not like it was now (in the mid 2020s), making this transgressive stuff… pretty effective.
For a bit, anyway. Look, I wasn’t there in 1991 by any means, and would get my chance to explore Zeni Geva much later; prior to music going full digital, but certainly at a point where a lot more of this style of stuff was in the aether, and Albini’s Big Black and had evolved into Shellac. So I can’t fully get into the mindset, but my listening experience is outlined above: I feel like you get the point of this disc after the pairing of opener I Want You and Total Castration introduce you to the two variations of composition on the disc: grind paired with a soloing guitar, and industrial-tinged drone/grind, and Null yelling the title with some occasional Japanese additions. That’s very dismissive for what ultimately is a solid slab of noise, but it takes a pass to accept that that’s the limit of the setup, and then YMMV how effective that is.
The sequencing does a good job of keeping it moving from sludgier tracks to those with a bit of underpinning groove, and slowburns that hit at the midpoint and end. Albini’s recording does the job of making this all seem like a machine made explicitly for the purpose of churning these noises out – a purposeful effect, I’d think – and that helps to counter the childishness of the vulgarity by dehumanizing it; additionally, it highlights the metallic clang of Eito’s percussion at key moments, and makes some of the layered guitars feel deathly, struggling to hit harder above the fray. At the same time, this is the band not quite committing to noise rock or drone, so it almost feels like Steve’s engineering / mix is more an attempt to frame that indecisiveness versus drawing out something stronger.
