Style: avant-garde, industrial, black metal, experimental, instrumental
Label: Dod Incarnate Records
Year: 2012
Home: Colorado
Members: Stefan Klein ~ all instruments
DJ Ribotic, Cold Metal Future ~ remixes
On this the final day of Pope Benedict XVI in office before becoming the first Pope Emeritus in hundreds of years it seems as good a time as any to share a review of Dethcentrik. I Think You Got The Clean Version brings up lots of assumptions even before the music spins. Some might be right. One assumption might be this is an album at one point so full of profanity that it would make a rapper blush. No, not really. There is no dirty-mouthed version & what's here I'd love to see if Tipper Gore called this is profanity. Is this profanity, Tipper, from "I Want To Kill Them All": "I want to kill them all/the rapists, dumb fucks/the rednecks, & their trucks/the idiots." It may not be Dylan-esque poetry but its straight from the gut feelings that many folks have & I don't call real feelings profanity. Okay, killing isn't good, but it doesn't take much to understand what the point is here. This is preening society of those who bring it down. Who has not wanted to do this? Even Tipper does. Or, even more so n "Realization Of Being In Hell": "Sometimes it feels like God hates me, like circumstances this bad can't be coincidence./The more I try to move past something/the more I'm reminded it's there./The further I look for the truth/more evidence for the lie I must bear./Why do I deserve to be here?" So, with these lyrics re-examine what you think the clean version might imply. Clean here might be a songwriter that's angry but by wiping away the lyrics that normally haunt his albums & leaving the anger to be interpreted with your own thoughts this really might be the clean version. Yes, there is anger, & often with a bit of a spiritual bend, as other songs include "Let Us Prey", "Scapes Of The Real", "A Quick Yet Painful Death" & "We Are Slaves To Machines". Dethcentrik has been called an industrial black metal band. Depending upon how you define industrial Dethcentrik still is or isn't. For those that see industrial in terms of Throbbing Gristle Dethcentrik has not gone anywhere else but only gotten more adventurous in the field. But, I believe most folks reading this blog aren't familiar with Throbbing Gristle & define industrial more in terms of Nine Inch Nails. For them I will say that Dethcentrik is still black but moving into a more avant-garde soundscape territory. The album that followed this one, The Fourth Reich goes even further with the soundscape idea & has all the angry lyrics this one doesn't have. Dethcentrik started out as a crashing drums, slashing guitars, shouted vocals & forever droning keyboards. Now there is more of a drone, less of a shout & more talking, less of the cacophonic disruptive crash. Now sounds are often distorted recordings of natural things. "Let Us Prey" sounds like heavily distorted guitars chugging through notes atonally, but knowing Dethcentrik it could be the changing of tv channels or a something else very common heavily electronically morphed. Against a fast drum beat & an eerie drone deep in the mix, probably also a non-instrument, Dethcentrik might still be difficult for some to listen to but has become fascinating because you probably have no idea what you're listening to. Dethcentrik becomes a band far more interesting than a one that says they have lots of emotion ... but the C chord however played is still the C chord. There's only so many sounds you can ring out of that before the word emotional or scary has no meaning has about as much shock value as Lady Gaga's new costume. Check out also "Realization Of Being In Hell" or the lengthy "A Quick Yet Painful Death" which is the drone of some distorted sound slowed down to unrecognizability. This is an Andy Warhol movie where anyone were anyone else would yell cut long before. Tolerance is key here, but Dethcentrik provides an interesting ride, with constant new output, for those interested in keeping track. Joining along for the ride is an addition to the Dethcentrik world via DJ Ribotic & Cold Metal Future. Each with their own track, I wouldn't call the songs remixes, but Dethcentrik has shared his music with others to great outcomes that are showing up more & more in the Dethcentrik catalog. The two guest artists take the simple lines of Dethcentrik, the simple droning, the single layers, & add to it quick beats, voices, quirky electronic lines & who knows what else for outcomes where it's hard to say what's Dethcentrik & what's the guest. I say this having heard a lot of Dethcentrik, too. Though, personally, the electronic quick beats lack variety & seem more just placed on the music than reflecting it. My suggestion would be beats that stop & start as the music takes a twist. There's a few moments of, I believe, real drums that do this.
No comments:
Post a Comment