Album Review – Disaesthetic

The Inhuman Condition

Somewhere in Russia

Uniform opened for Deafheaven last Friday at Brick by Brick. I stood alone with my Perfect World shirt among all the Sunbathers anxious to see the cataclysm again.

Over the next 45 minutes Uniform won over the audience with hammering power riffs showered in dissonant preamp corruption. By the end, crossed arms turned to pumped fists, headbanging, and even nodding from the scene queens. For the uninitiated imagine Big Black but with Greg Ginn on guitar or Black Flag discovering Lightening Bolt.

Uniform proudly announced their third album was released that day. The Long Walk salutes Stephen King’s book of the same title and theme. Singer Michael Beldan contemplates his religion and place in society’s world order and examines his guilt in refusing to confirm with pursuing the corporate game, which I’ve struggled to reconcile myself lately. “The Walk” renounces Catholicism in exodus punishing theological rule while revealing guitarist Ben Greenberg’s approach for the rest of the album.

Slower in pace compared to Wake in Fright‘s frenzied pummeling attitude, Greenberg added more weight and noise to his rig, compressing the bedlam between the listeners ears.

Recorded and mixed extremely dry sonically, the album reminds one of My War side two. Intentionally overwhelming in tone from guitar to bass drum. Uniform recruited drummer Greg Fox (Liturgy) who establish his place in the mix and on stage.

Uniform repeatedly circle back to guitar patterns like Black Flag’s “Three Nights” to centralize around societies desultory disarray. “Transubstantiation” utilizes this concept best when Greenberg compact crushes cars with his Ampeg Dan Armstrong clear Lucite at the onset and again after the fanatic interlude. The same motif reprises on “Headless Eyes” with Fox drubbing his kit.

The final minute has an incredible double bass barrage which got the audience banging our heads and fists in unison.

The Long Walk also reflects on the journey back to the forces we refused. Beldan ruminates the social order we all must arbitrate, whether it’s our professional careers, personal relationships, or participation in the financial markets.

It’s a long meditation to just compose your desires, what you really want, and then deciphering if it can fit within society’s frame. What must we compromise of ourselves to flourish? Can we justify the trade offs? These artists ask this of themselves and in turn their audience.

Mutual compromise offers value however the line between happiness and resentment hazes with more convolution with each generation.

Uniform looks bleakly at humanity while growing more topical with each record. There’s a cultural neurosis for many entering their early adult years this decade. This is a soundtrack for defining your place in this mess.

EDITED BY JAKE BARNES

All The Songs Were About You

I’ve intentionally waited since Brand New returned. A lot happened during a few hours and days when new music leaked online. Five hundred limited edition vinyl pre-orders for an untitled Brand New album put the music community on its backside. Those lucky enough to make the purchase received a CD in the mail folded in brown paper with a black and white image of the band. Could’ve easily been mistaken for a Godspeed! album or a deranged manifesto with anthrax sealed within. The music was promptly ripped and put online to manifest plagues of theories and discoveries. Science Fiction came to be by the fanatic curiosity of fans and the band’s own admission. Let’s cut the conspiracies though. Brand New intentionally waited for this moment, for years.

This was an organized coup to grasp the attention of the world for a brief moment. They’ve watched others do it over the last few years. Beyoncé in late 2013 ambushed everyone after quietly working her self-titled album for a year. She hit everyone with her best work to date. I can say the same for Brand New. It’s their best work since 2006’s The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me. I’m sure same disagree but Daisy might as well not exist to me. Perhaps it’s a sign to retry it again. Then again I’ve said that since it’s release. Some opinions are set in stone, but I wanted to make sure I gave Science Fiction time to solidify rather than ejaculating with first impressions.

Self-revival, wise, reinvention, and “debatably the band’s greatest album” will take life on the internet forever. Science Fiction exists as a great sequel, think Clerks 2, about who Brand New was last decade, influencing alternative rock forever, and who they are now. Rather than just make another record during the height of their financial success they’ve constructed a great album that pays homage to the past but still offers well written and diverse songs that can easily hold you for an hour.

The opening dialog on “Lit Me Up” between a therapist and patient sets the leitmotif for the entire album. The whole experience sounds like therapy sessions mixed in with some reverence of the past. “Can’t Get It Out” takes you back to Deja Entendu. “Waste” and “Could Never Be Heaven” sound like they came from The Devil and God sessions. Many of these songs refer nostalgically to The Devil and God. Obviously that’s a good sonance to possess however I’m critical of emulating an album from over ten years ago, no matter how fantastic it was then and influencial it remains now.

At the same time I have to praise their sentimentality not simply because we’re fortunate to have new music but it’s simply enjoyable. It’s a full canvas, not just a single or two with some filler tracks. This era of musicians focus on building one incredible song rather than a rich experience of pressing play and letting go for a while.

“Out of Mana” counters my critique earlier with the best moments of Science Fiction. It has elements of Deja, Devil and God, and Daisy while presenting a new unheard edge from the band. More rock than reservation. There’s optimism rather than gloom. In this period of my life, and perhaps their’s too, I’m looking for a positive outlook rather than the nihilism of my youth. Most of these bands I came to love in my teens aged appropriately with me. Reminds me of Japandroid’s album this year.

From “In The Water” through spectacular anthem “Batter Up” finishes the record stronger from where it started. Immediately I wouldn’t call it Brand New’s best work; however, I expect it to age just as well as the rest of their catalog. Many bands fail to make respectable music after a long hiatus. I hope Science Fiction bridges us from their last incarnation to the next one.

Tired & Bored

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They’ve been around for years, but six releases in Us and US Only have their first full length record Full Flower. I found them in 2011 when Andrew, Jake, and I ran our little music blog. During that time we were falling all over ourselves discovering the Baltimore music scene. We wrote several pieces about it. One of those treasures Us and Us Only had just come out with their Rapture single. Tumblr, of course, spread the art cover rather than music. A common practice then and likely now.

Most of the Baltimore bands were loud, noisy, or ultra heavy but they sounded like Pompeii or The World is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die. It’s the kind of sound I like to fill my apartment living room with. It’s not too loud but has those moments we’re on the edge of being resounding and suddenly we’re going to some far off place at the edge of earth. It’s the same feeling a get when I travel anywhere that’s miles away from my and everyone’s bullshit. US & Us Only sound like sitting on the shinkansen peacefully waiting to get somewhere or looking down at some beautiful overview while drinking a cold one and smoking a cigarette. They’re that hipster band you just kind of fall in love with and keep for your hipster self.

The record flows like two movements. Every song moves into the next smoothly. The transitions aren’t immediately like Mew’s And the Glass Handed Kites but it’s easy to put on track one and realize track six feels like the end of the first song. That’s high complement for a time where most records don’t feel like records. They’re just a bunch of songs along with hopefully a single. Full Flower has at least 3 singles but all the songs work together. It’s one of the few new records I’ve bought on vinyl.

“Kno” and “Bored of Black” hymns themes of fatigue with relationships and consistent mentions of boredom and weariness. They represent the first half of the album well. There’s also a deliberate approach to steadily filling a room with sound. Never too much at once and I never feel like it’s too immediate. When the chorus comes in on “Bored of Black” I’m ready to join in or move my body. “My Mouth” quietly builds up to a teetering point releasing full distortion and restraint. I never feel there’s even a build up or drop with these songs. Every moment sounds natural and instinctive.

“Full Flower” has the same on the cusp of breaking moments too. The post-chorus mesmer makes you fall out, wake up to the reprisal of the chorus, and flawlessly transition into “Lawn” which got by me the first time. “Dresses” relents from caution a third way through. A brief loose semblance. Closing out, “Winter Sails” was the very first single for the band in 2010. It’s stripped down, quiet, and fits as a last call for a magnificent debut.