7th December 2009

Video with 2 notes

Rhythm & Noise - Contents Under Notice (Ralph)

I picked up more than a dozen records at Saturday’s WMUA Vinyl Sale.  This was one of them.  I didn’t know anything really about it, except that it was on the Residents’ record label, so I knew it would be weird.  The LP is an atmospheric, metallic, ambient sprawl full of synthesizers, human voices, grinding machines, whimpering animals, and car horns.  It’s heavy.

Side 1 (“File Under Soundtracks”), feels like the music that might go on while your brain literally melts - or maybe a Max Payne-esque drug hallucination.  It sounded like what the soundtrack to Requiem for a Dream might have been if the movie was set in a dystopian future, but made in the early ’80s.  The occasional scream, or crying animal gives way to police sirens, and I couldn’t help but think this is what kids terrified of drugs imagine life in a crack-den to be like.  It’s a bad trip.  The side’s climax occurs outside, with car horns coming from all directions.  They start to die out, as you’re swallowed whole by the very city itself.

The other side, Side A (“File Under Sound Effects”), is one in which you might find yourself awakening inside the stomach of the monster.  At first, it’s calm as you float downstream, towards the thresher.  And then you’re digested by the urban machine.  This side is all sorts of gnarly grinding, but you’re still on that bad trip, but it’s actually getting better.  For a time.  Then it starts wearing off, and all that’s left is the sound of those gears grinding, those teeth tearing you apart.

Highly recommended.

Tagged: taking drugs to make music to take drugs togetting into a serious thing