| CD REVIEW Psyopus |
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Band: Psyopus My oh my, quite a lot has happened since Rochester (New York) based Avant-Garde/Math/GrindCore Metal act Psyopus released their February 2007 sophomore album Our Puzzling Encounters Considered (a review of which by yours truly, which is still available to those seeking info on the band’s earlier history, was posted on 18/02/2007)! In fact, the only member remaining from the line-up that delivered that incendiary album is originator and guitarist Christopher Arp, commonly known as Arpmandude. To begin with, Jon Cole, who’d played the drums on OPEC (funny that album title should abreviate that way!), was replaced by Jason Bauers for live activity during a lengthy run of US shows with Dysrhythmia and Behold…The Arctopus throughout March and April. April saw the band continue their busy live schedule inn alliance with Job For A Cowboy and Cannibal Corpse. In September, bassist Michael Horn (a graduate from the Shenandoah Conservatory with a degree in Arts Management with a minor in Jazz bass alongside two years of classical bass training at the renowned music institution) replaced original member Fred DeCoste. At the same time Psyopus exchanged their original siinger Adam Frappolli for Harrison Christie of The Jefferson Planecrash. However, prior to the recordings for the new album (like OPEC, supervised by producer Doug White), which took place between July 20 and August 16 of 2008, an announcement was issued by the band that their new vocalist would be Matt Dalbert of Burn Everything, but according to the band Dalbert flaked out shortly after their announcement…and a replacement was swiftly found in Brian Woodruff of As This Body, I Exist repute. Following the recordings, the band allied with War From A Harlot’s Mouth, Fuck The Facts, and Left To Vanish for the Grinding Into Cataclysm tour…went out on their own in the latter part of October and the first part of November, and followed that up with more North American dates supporting Japan’s Melt Banana in the second part of that month. And apparently membership with Psyopus is of a very volatile nature (either that, or too demanding), because in January 2009 the bassist left (and I’m uncertain as to whether that happened before or àfter the band’s 3-day stint in Russia), the band finding a temporary replacement with former Reciprocal and current Bellicist man Brent Glover. The new album is everything the previous one was, and more! The frantic freakiness is of a same level, with Arp bringing his usual guitar style (a mixture of molre conventional riffs interlaced with a frivolous amount of Jazz-flavoured freak-out Math Metal play). Vocally, there’s a little more diversity, thanks to the occasional addition of female vocals…although you’ll have to wait until the latter part of track N°4 (“Duct Tape Smile”) before finding the inclusion of some hysteric female screaming. No match for what happens on “Boogeyman” though, which has several passages where a bunch of guests (two of which female) recite lyrics with each of ‘em saying one word at a time. Somewhat confusing to say the least! More female vocal participation comes on “Choker Chain”, with short “sentences” (“Do you love me?”, “I miss you!”, “I love you”, “Baby, kiss me!”, “Hug me!”, “Hold Me!”, and “I want you!” put in a short loop before the final phrase “I’m gonna fuck you!” comes just once) strewn all over the song. In between those musicless moments, the band goes their usual merry frantic way. Which doesn’t mean that everything is just all-out loud on this album, you know! For the short instrumental “Imogen’s Puzzle Pt.2”, you get a rather calm mood from the band…although they make it different by playing it in reverse! Also, “Ms Shyflower” gets a very serene intro with abbey brothers doin’ a nice (but short) choral bit…I’m not sure how it relates to the rest of the song though! Finally, there’s the beautiful…and with 9:15 duration you might even say lengthy, if not tóó much so, because the track IS quite diverting…instrumental album closing “A Murder To Child”, where Arp combines an almost acoustic guitar (albeit no distortion, but quite a bit of Chorus effect, I’d guess) with the Classical tones of a violin and cello. Although this track has quite a few passages where he plays very much in standard to Classical Guitar play, I don’t need to tell you that he manages to bring in some of his Jazzy overtoned play and frantic note-fucking style in the music as well! The band posted an mp3-file of the new album’s track “The Burning Halo” at myspace.com/psyopus as early as November 4 (alongside two songs off each of their previous albums), later also adding “Medusa”…both perfect examples of the “more excited” type of Psyopus music with all its intricacies, displaying the usual highly technical contents of the album! Still, I insist that to get a truly good insight on this band’s lunacy, you need to listen to its albums overall! Huh…now we’re talking lunacy…on top of the 10 listed “regular” songs (total duration just over 41 minutes), the band added a non-listed bonus track. In reality this is a very lengthy (20:34) collage existing of rediculous musical bits on the one side, and a series of self-made ludicrously funny “advertisements” on the other side. It’s just the band goofing off, really, but still with some occasional display of Arp’s technicall abilities on the guitar! I don’t need to tell you, I guess, that I had already nominated Odd Senses into my “Best Albums Of 2009” after a first listen, the same way it’s predecessor had gone! Of course, that’s a very personal appreciation, and I can understand that other people can’t be bothered to listen to material they cannot get into right-away. However, as far as I’m concerned personally, I am one of those people who’ll always be confronted with a lot of different music, regardless of what I come across thaks to Concrete Web, and I dare say I need me some of this more complex stuff every once in a while…just as an “intellectual” exercise, you know! And…in case you were wondering whether I’d indeed gotten myself the band’s debut album (as I said I would do in my review of their previous album), I can tell you that the answer is positive…and that I haven’t regretted that purchase for one inkling of a moment!!! 98/100 Tony. |