Saturday, January 23, 2010

OUR LOVE WILL DESTROY THE WORLD "FUCKING DRACULA CLOUDS" (Blackest Rainbow)

Latest slab of wax from the aforementioned Campbell Kneale, this time two songs split into four distinct movements, each with their own pace and identity. Side A kicks off with "The Pleasure's Everlasting", opening with a low-end guitar drone and "Criminally Insane" style drum pattern that comes really close to the Birchville aesthetic on "Chi Vampires". After about a minute the floodgates open and a whoosh of uncontrolled feedback and guitar discordia comes washing in, sliming the track in sticky high-pitched waste as the whole thing rumbles along for a good eight minutes. This first part ends and gives way to a roar of formless electricity that seems lifted from (or maybe a continuation of) the form displayed on "Blondesummer Snowqueen", all high-end skree and whir with little regard to structure or pacing, ending as abruptly as it started. Side B is titled "In Sleep We Creep", perhaps preparing the listener for an extended drone workout or a hearkening back to the earliest roots of Birchville, but again Kneale throws a wrench in everything and produces an honest-to-god agitated guitar riff that shambles along unchanging and hectic, feeling like some sweaty frenetic ball being thrown against a wall by a meth addict. Very unnerving and unending, draped in layers of skronk and guitar static. The track ends with the hinted at twinkling sky drones (at least in name), layered and dense and oozing but not fully removed from the nervousness displayed at the commencement (the barely perceptible four on the floor drumbeat underneath makes sure that there's some sort of skittery propulsion). This is a seriously on-edge side from Campbell, a quality not usually found in his work and leading to the obvious question of where things are headed. The grey and cloudy cover art would have us believe that we're in something of a comfort zone, an area where things are floaty and weighty only in our heads, but maybe that's where it's going to be at its worst. Maybe it's a reflection of shared disillusionment and an audio expression of worry. The tension's thick; the rain is coming-fucking dracula clouds.

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