Are you prepared for the soundtrack of da nu urban madness? No do not run off we haven’t gone all wigga on yo butts or anything, you are still in the right place, it is just this Swiss trios way of playing with our heads and preconceptions that anything black metal orientated should speak lingo like this. I believe that they used to play a much purer form of BM but this their second album is anything but, as is par of the course with the eccentric music their label has the skill at handpicking this throws everything in together and stirs it all up.
‘Mind da Gap’ starts up flailing away with massive swaggering guitars and drums blasting behind a vocal roar. It’s a short barrage as sounds of footsteps, doors opening, traffic and sirens take us to an urban landscape before second number ‘You Vs The Modern Lifestyle Obsession’ carries on the album of odd song titles. This sounds like a fierce blackened early Voivod with a spastic blur akin to Krallice coming from the mad guitar riffing. There is no problems head banging here, it’s just that you should not expect to be doing so for the full 63 minutes of the album as nothing is going to remain quite what it seems. Just as you are getting used to the frantic attacking pace another preposterously entitled track decides to down swing into a brief passage of jazz before getting the knives out to some suicidal sounding angst infected BM. ‘Rebellion’ relocates to a snooker hall by sounds of it and has a house band on hand playing a strutting, finger clicking up-tempo guitar jam, which is reminiscent of a Rockabilly sort of style. After this things continue down abstract routes, ‘Friday - Trapped In Mental Disorder’ unlocking doors to the mind and unveiling low groaning vocals, smoochy saxophone and more unhinged vocals and melodic guitar rages. It all has a very schizophrenic and unique air, a bit like Solefald after too many pills perhaps, leaving you never knowing what is coming next.
By ‘CRY. Sys’ the guitars are having a hypnotic effect as we merge some shoe-gaze meandering with some subtle electronics, and then a jagged rock heavy melody. There is also a sampled female voice announcing the words “hardcore motherfucker,” which the ultraviolent amongst you may recognise. I like the way the band have a tagline on their page stating ‘No Posh No Fun.’ This is very much in line with their narrative which I interpret about concentrating on the low paid drone and unemployed; the disenfranchisement and alienation and madness that life deals them, lets face it most of us ca no doubt affiliate with this. In doing so they have built up a rich musical tapestry, telling tales as it progresses. Despair is heard clearly in the maudlin ‘Metro Aesthetix’ and you can almost smell the rags of someone down on their luck begging for spare change.
All in all ‘Thirteen Urban Days’ is an emotion packed ride, richly inventive and full of ideas. Having said that you do need to give it your all to even scratch the surface and this is no quick dip for the casual observer sort of album. It’s strange as I always had romantic visions of alpine snow capped mountains and chocolate and cuckoo clocks from this band’s home country but this shows the other side and the grim underbelly of its urban impoverishment. If you really want to sniff the Swiss piss, this is your musical urinal!
http://www.myspace.com/blutmondofficial
