Two near hits

The two albums discussed here are very similar in one crucial way: both use riffs that are derived from obvious “inherent” musical structures in such a way to appear modifications of an off-the-shelf technique, which muffles the clarity of organic expression the artist is trying to achieve. Of the two, I’m more positively disposed to the Beithíoch because it is less self-consciously aware of its audience, but is still too self-conscious regarding itself. The end result in both is like seeing someone put up a bone-normal scaffold, and then strategically paint it random colors or alter its shape; you can still discern the underlying shape, so it does not appear to have a genesis of its own, but be a conscious alteration of a normal format for some demonstrative purpose. In the Beithíoch it is acceptable because this band is attempting to stretch itself past its previous tendency to make wallpaper music, which cycled in the background but achieved no direction. Blut Aus Nord should know better.

Beithíoch – Dúchas

A music reviewer can have no friends. He cannot allow any personal motivations or feelings to get in the way. If he likes you, or you just stole his girlfriend and he hates you, he has to separate your album from you and judge it on its artistic merits, with an eye not for casting aside so much as pulling out whatever of value is there. As said above, Beithíoch resembles scaffolding that has been strategically modified to game your brain into thinking you see a different shape. It is boxy. However, when it waxes ambient, it does well, both in the keyboardy/distortiony parts and in the use of King Crimson-esque lead picked chord progressions and high speed noodling. Like earlier Beithíoch, this one has a crisis of knowing what the songs are about. This one-man band has just about nailed his technique, including song development and epic-feeling conclusions, but the parts don’t all connect up and so the boxiness hits us in the face. Much like myself, often he needs to de-cerebralize and just let fly with some feeling and if it comes out as three notes and someone chanting “Watermelon Penis Bouffant Christ,” that’s OK too. There’s a lot of promise here but it’s like a vocabulary in search of a topic.

Blut Aus Nord – 777 – The Desanctification

Thematically this is a near remake of Abyssic Hate’s much-celebrated and immediately forgotten 2000 album “Suicidal Emotions” and will be forgotten for much the same reason: it is a manipulation of surface attributes without any underlying direction, narrative or structure. The result is that you become immersed in a particular mood, and then it stops. Each song is like a fragment of a painting, enough to pick up on one mood that is in common between all of these songs, but not enough to figure out the story or where it fits in. In addition, it’s “boxy” in the sense of using archetypes with slight modifications that are designed to game your perception and make you think something new has been created. This is as much deskwork as crafting a memo or making a sales call. The resulting insincere shit is not particularly interesting musically and has nothing to offer otherwise, although it appears to be intense and so fools the same people who are getting fooled by Opeth and Ulver but want something “heavier.” d00d

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13 thoughts on “Two near hits”

  1. penis in my dicks says:

    every negative review here is the same

  2. @furious says:

    Technology wasn’t advanced enough to show it back then, but he actually stuck that giant rubber hand up their asses. On the third hit he pulled out their prostates. I guess nowadays they would show that with some crazy cutscene and a button mashing minigame or something.

  3. typical Blut Aus Nord fan says:

    I’m sure you didn’t even really listen to The Desanctification. Blut Aus Nord is excellent music to have interracial gay sex to. How dare you criticize such musical geniuses! Blut Aus Nord is a celebration of ethnic diversity and gay pride! You just don’t understand the complexity of their music.

  4. Serious Questioner says:

    alright fagos!

    I’m sick of you guys ignoring me all the time!!! I am the only one here besides Brutal Slayer of Christians that is NOT a troll, I come here trying to ask good intelligent serious questions that nobody pays attention to and Im sick of that!

    Ill try again:

    IS SLAYER’S MUSIC DEATH METAL OR THRASH-SPEED METAL?? SPECIALLY THE EARLY ALBUMS, IS THAT DEATH METAL OR IS IT THRASH-SPEED METAL?

    PEOPLE IN THIS SITE CLASSIFY SLAYER AS DEATH METAL BUT EVERYWHERE ELSE SLAYER IS SEEN AS A THRASH BAND…

  5. Watermelon penis says:

    Yeah Prozak, like when Robert Ritual stole your girl friend and then you reviewed his band Ritual as being shit, why would that be?

    a- because Ritual is shit

    b- because he called you a gay botanist and fucked your girl

  6. TROLL AMERIKA.ORG says:

    DUNNO IF YOU GUYS HAVE NOTICED BUT TROLLING AMERIKA.ORG IS ULTRA FUNNY BECAUSE BRETT STEVENS GETS ULTRA PISSED!

  7. Serious Answer says:

    Slayer is the opposite of everything these ass-pies pretend it is.

  8. fact says:

    THRASH METAL: METALLICA, SLAYER, MEGADETH, MORBID PRIEST, ETC.

    CROSSOVER: DRI, S.O.D, SUICIDAL TENDENCIES, ETC.

  9. brutal slayer of christians, noble hessian warrior of death says:

    Maybe this video will motivate you faggots to lift heavy shit:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dc44CzJnl3k

  10. suddenly aspies everywhere says:

    lol @ calling Metallica and Megadeth thrash metal.

    lol @ throwing a tantrum over genre names.

    lol @ anyone who got into thrash metal after 1990 or black and death after 2000 and thinks they know shit about it just because wikipedo or metal-arkikes says so.

    lol @ kids these days. Spoiled little shits who think they’re awesome but have yet to prove themselves out in the real world.

    lol @ anyone who thinks that they learned something just because they found a website that says so (even if that website is anus.com)

  11. suddenly aspies everywhere says:

    lol @ Europeans who think they’re better than us Americans just because their culture is older. Guys, seriously there’s nothing left of your culture except some old buildings and they will be replaced with mosques in the next 25 years anyway.

    lol @ fat people who demand free healthcare. Learn to take of yourselves you fucking slobs!

    lol @ countries that have nuclear weapons but never use them. Then why the fuck did you spend billions of dollars on them you imbeciles? Stop being pussies and just blow up some countries already.

    lol @ midgets. Those tiny little fucks should be exterminated for the improvement of mankind.

    lol @ the extra large buttplug I’m sitting on atm. I don’t feel a damn thing!

  12. same poster as above says:

    wow, this looks really nice:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fosK83Hje5E

  13. same poster as above says:

    That tiny thing is just gonna fall out of my huge gaping asshole. Try this for size:
    http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3244/3046767779_e57efd9389.jpg

    And it looks nice and cheerful too! Please, someone give me this as a christmas present! I’ll love you forever!

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