on the pulse - 2021 - #26 - devin townsend, richard dawson & circle, cody jinks, elbow, der weg einer freiheit, amine
And I think this week will wrap up the majority of Patreon asks - a few other small holdovers plus Arca which I’ll cover in the next week or two, no worries there, unless something large drops from out of the blue - so let’s get On The Pulse!
Amine - TWOPOINTFIVE - So I’m guessing this is a holdover mixtape until whatever Amine is looking to push next, where he’s throwing out more pop flourishes and showcasing some of the wild creativity that has kept his career moving after his breakthrough hit? Well, in a way it is: chirpy synths playing off Amine pitch-shifting his voice all over the place, bouncy trap grooves playing off gentle, shambling percussion, all of which seems to play for shallow flexing that only barely obscures a lingering depression and angst that he can’t quite escape or satiate, and also keeps his delivery more muted and lethargic. And while he’s funny in a low-key witty sort of way, it’s hard to escape the feeling that this should feel like more fun than it is - you’d think embracing more pop textures would have led to a brighter, splashier project complete with all of Amine’s off-kilter charm, especially as compositionally Amine is as sharp as ever, and while some of that is still here, I kept waiting for a hook or sharper song to really jump out of the pop experimentation, and I struggled to find one. Maybe it’s because so many of these songs feel so short, barely ever getting a second verse, or how the trap elements lead to a heavier, more atmospheric vibe that doesn’t flatter Amine’s energy and that’s not counting the songs that just feel unfinished. Maybe it’s just the chipmunk vocals that prevented me from getting as deep into this as I’d like, but this feels like a decent throwaway, at best. 6/10, take it or leave it.
Der Weg einer Freiheit - Noktvrn - Apologies for my awful German, once again. So I covered this band in the very first episode of the Trailing Edge way back at the end of 2017, when I’ll admit I was still very much in the process of exploring the edges of black metal and while I had liked a decent bit of what I had heard, especially after translating the lyrics, the band didn’t quite vary their sound enough to really grab me and the production had felt inconsistent. But hey, I did like it and I’m reaching the end of a year looking for more black metal, so I wanted to give this a proper shot and… well, it’s more interesting than I was expecting, not just showcasing pivots outside of black metal towards slower, more atmospheric and progressive arrangements with touches of horns and synth, but also featuring the occasional clean singing and lyrics in English on ‘Immortal’! But what you’re more likely to notice is the low end and grooves, where even if I question how much texture they have - though that’s true across the board for a band that in general sounds way cleaner than I normally prefer in black metal - the bass is way more prominent to underscore the tremolo shredding and the flat out insane drumwork. And while it’s certainly distinctive, it has the feel of simply turning up the low end presence without using it to accent the melodies as well as they could outside of a standout like ‘Gegen das Licht’. Kind of a shame, because such a dense and manic performance with grooves this potent should pack a more distinctive wallop than it does, especially as once I translated the lyrics, there was promise here once again. It’s an album that feels like it’s on the cusp of reality and nightmare, the known and unknown, the straggling light amidst the lingering chaos of darkness… but the strain of being on that border is seeking to rend this project asunder and eventually the protagonist tumbles into an uncertain night. But overall… ugh, this is right on the cusp of being legit excellent, the high points kick a lot of ass and I’m not sure there’s a bad song here, but a little fine-tuning and emphasis on making those thicker grooves truly stick would have had this in greatness. Extremely strong 7/10, but if you’re into black metal, you should really check this out.
Elbow - Flying Dream 1 - I’ll be honest, I had low expectations for this one. The last Elbow album leaned really hard on blocky, staccato grooves and messy compositions that created a sour, weirdly detached vibe that never coalesced as well as it should have, especially with the more politically charged content. So hearing that the newest project was leaning more into ballad territory was actually a bit encouraging for me - this band can do really well in more subtle, understated territory - and here… honestly, I’m not sure it’s going to be for everyone, given that it’s more reminiscent of the soft-focus textures that dominated their early 2010s work and could feel a little tepid or underwhelming, but I actually enjoyed this a lot more than I thought I would! Part of this is how Elbow has embraced more of the richer vocal arrangements to support the padded keyboards and guitar lines, the gentle but firm and textured bass grooves and impeccably balanced production that never oversells it, the sort of prog and art pop that has a decent amount of real complexity if you pay attention to the finer details of the composition, but never neglects the hooks, that thanks to Guy Garvey’s unique vocal timbre will always find a way to slip into your head. Now this album is definitely very ballad-heavy and slow-paced - it’s only about forty-five minutes but if you’re not into it I can see this dragging - and that’s why I’m actually happy I could get into the lyrics this time around. Unsurprising for an album written in the course of lockdown, it focuses on a return to childhood memories and simpler, borderline dreamlike lovestruck moments, with plenty of wistful gazes towards the untold wonders beyond in the sky paired with a unmistakably British parochial earnestness that some may find cloying for how sweet it can be, but I felt was handled tastefully with a lot of understated charm. So… yeah, I actually wound up thinking this was pretty great, probably the most I’ve enjoyed an Elbow album since the 2000s - perhaps a little sentimental for some, but for me this is a light 8/10; a late year pleasant surprise that I was really happy to find.
Cody Jinks - Mercy / None The Wiser (Caned By Nod) - I’m a little surprised that even if you’re into the indie country scene how quickly this album seemed to disappear from conversation - even if I think Jinks’ material has been uneven the past five or so years, I was excited to discover that he was dropping not just a country project, but a metal album as well, calling back to his roots! I was thinking of splitting that review into its own piece, but unfortunately it feels like some pretty stock groove metal and early grunge where the broadly sketched writing might make sense, but the vocal mix is really sloppy, the drums have no power, and as much as I think the basslines have some muscle to back up the crunchy shredding, the muddy mix bereft of great dynamics and the actual compositions don’t really stand out as well as they should. But alright, let’s address what would be the primary project with Mercy… and yep, it sure sounds like a midtier Cody Jinks album. And yes, I’m fully aware of how that sounds, especially as this is in generally pretty good: it plays to a slightly more ragged, percussive palette, but with more defined grooves, sharper lead guitar and pedal steel melodies, and warmer production that doesn’t have the obvious production missteps of his last three albums - major improvements here! And Cody Jinks’s rich vocal timbre is still as pleasing as ever even if you can tell it’s taken some wear in recent years… and yet I’m only just lukewarm on this, and I think it comes down to the writing. I’ve been saying for years that Jinks’ hangdog style of hard living can often feel painted in broad strokes, where a little more detail would help add a little more meat to the larger-than-life pictures, and you’d think that a country project that feels a little more world-weary and a bit more introspective would have it… but if you’ve been listening to Cody Jinks in the past decade, you’ve heard him play this material over and over and while there’s more of a stoic romanticism to a few songs, it’s not like that’s new either. I guess I can respect this for being a little more humble with a little more maturity in between the lines, but at least here, Jinks is so deep in his niche that there’s very little I need to add. So strong 6/10, honestly that’s being generous.
Richard Dawson & Circle - Henki - So when I reviewed 2020 a few years back, I articulated how I wasn’t quite sure that Richard Dawson’s sound was clicking for me. Yeah, some of it was his unique, creaking vocal timbre, some of it was his persistently downbeat but shockingly raw nihilism, and some of it was production choices that just didn’t click, but I had my doubts with this new project teaming up with the Finnish progressive rock band Circle, who have cranked out a distressing number of albums throughout the the past thirty years that sprawl across grunge, krautrock, metal, and even ambient music. So where does Henki take us? Well, even if I’m not quite sure it hits the highest notes of the best songs of Peasant… I actually think this might be the closest I’ve come to liking a Richard Dawson album all the way through, where I’m actually a little startle by how many folks seem to be thrown by how ‘weird’ it supposedly is. Dawson may have described the project as a ‘flora-themed hypno-folk-metal album’, but if anything it reminds me more texturally of the classic, folk-tinged prog rock of the late 60s and early 70s - the warmer organic bass grooves and jangling guitar passages feel significantly better balanced and give Dawson’s peculiar voice a foundation he absolutely needs, the touches of glittery organic synth are better blended, there’s more of a focus on delivering a hook amidst circular, cycling melodic progressions, and even if I still don’t like Dawson’s falsetto at all, there’s something about his lilting delivery that fits this odder brand of prog, similar to how he worked in Peasant. Hell, it’s such a solid fit that it’s honestly tough to nitpick outside of the fact that I wouldn’t really say this has the heft of ‘metal’ beyond the earliest flourishes of the genre, but when it’s prog this solid, it’s really damn hard to care outside of some compositions that meander in odd places, like the panting mid-section of ‘Silphium’ or the meandering back half of ‘Methuselah’ or that utterly weird synth bridge on ‘Lily’ that eventually bleeds into the final track which unfortunately ends the album on a bit of a flat note. That takes us to the content, where for an album where the title loosely translates to ‘ghost’ or ‘spirit’ you might think you’ll know where it goes with Dawson’s downbeat, frequently depressing stylism, and ‘Lily’ as a lead-off single about a haunted hospital seems to signify going into that darkness. But in reality Dawson is leaning much more heavily on plant iconography, living texture to the generational stories and references to myths that we tell to make sense of a world that’s so much bigger and unknowable than fallible humans will ever realize… even as we study or destroy some of those plants along the way, with the lost herb of silphium as the most telling example. And yet I think it’s that frequent presence of wonderment at those plants and life that persist that gives the writing here a little more vigor - a parallel to the spirits, perhaps, something that’ll never quite leave us. Either way, this is a damn great album - definitely playing to a vintage classic prog vibe and Dawson’s framing and delivery will not be for everyone, but this is a pairing that clicked amazingly well - 8/10, really did enjoy this!
Devin Townsend - The Puzzle / Snuggles - And now we’ve got one of the big ones, where Townsend was dropping two projects in quick succession… with both leaning on predominantly ambient tones, with The Puzzle featuring more vocals, extraneous instrumental passages and sound effects, and a fractured sound collage approach, and Snuggles as a shorter, more comforting ambient picture. Both were reportedly inspired by the lockdown experience of 2020… and on some level, you can tell, with Snuggles being serene and relaxing and trying to find some sense of inner peace and stability, while The Puzzle… it has the utterly frantic, careening feel of being thrown into a cyclone of competing musical elements and voices where making much sense of any of it is an exercise in futility. No, seriously, I was about to come here and say that despite multiple listens this album just defeated me in terms of making sense of it, a puzzle I couldn’t solve… but if you were treating last year with a belief in coherent rationality, I’m not sure you can get to a logical answer. Now granted, my counterpoint is that a lot of last year made a depressing amount of sense if you were aware of the longstanding political rot across the board - and it makes it all the more jarring Townsend doesn’t get political with it beyond vague appeals to broadly sketched new age enlightenment, it’s certainly not as dark as Townsend was indicating it could be - but what I find more jarring here is the actual execution; to put it bluntly, this became a puzzle I did not want to solve. Once again any trace of organic texture has been blasted away from the symphonic arrangements which leave even the acoustics, strings, horns, and woodwinds feeling frail, the drums sound sterile and the bass grooves nonexistent, nothing here comes close to delivering on a hook or real heaviness before fracturing into a blast of seedy, synth-inflected kooky zaniness that without more dynamic range or compositional structure gets stale really fast, and there’s no real sense of progression over the course of a hour. Which yes, makes sense in terms of encapsulating the previous year, where the madcap improvisational weirdness is the point and you’re clinging to whatever routine you can find, and I know to Townsend’s diehard fans his exploration of a more scattered, deconstructive approach to composition can feel like a cool experiment, maybe even a callback to Devlab, one of his experimental projects in the mid-2000s, and if you pay attention to the details there are compositional touchpoints where you can loosely sketch to where Townsend’s focus was, specifically the references to podcasts and healing from trauma. But when you sacrifice your underrated compositional tightness to go for this, and there’s enough production issues to make this feel like a headache, and as of yet we don’t have the visual component to pull this all together, I’m not sure there’s much replay unless you’re trying to “solve” this album. Whereas for an ambient project, Snuggles is trying to do exactly what it says in the title: give you a warmly atmospheric, major-chord feeling of new age comfort and peace, on a cushion of shimmering, half-heard vocals, fluttery keys, rich strings, very gentle percussion, the occasional splash of reverbed guitars, and a smattering of woodwinds. Honestly, even beyond my growing fondness for ambient music, I did like this a bit more in terms of sonic balance, transitions, and flow… even if it feels busier than you might like including containing a few actual grooves, all the while still lacking in texture, with more focus on saturating the mix rather than using the negative space within it. So no, not the follow-up to Casualties of Cool that I’d love to hear Townsend make - a closer parallel is probably Ghost - but still quite pleasant, if not particularly striking within ambient music. So for The Puzzle… honestly, if there’s an album where rating it is functionally pointless, I’d say it’s here, but for me it’s a 5/10. Snuggles gets a solid 6/10 for being a little better… but I won’t lie and say I wasn’t a bit disappointed.