On sending all our esteemed reviewers a list of what was up for grabs to be covered over the next couple of weeks, it was no great surprise to see that there were no takers for Berliners Redcraving. They were however an interesting proposition and one I was quite willing to take up being intrigued by a rather strange descriptive word they used in describing themselves, ‘emotronic.’ Firstly I was glad to say they were not what I would class as emo and are a much more volatile mix of aggression, although there are times such as when they adopt a clean vocal tone on ‘Separate’ when they do stray into that territory. The ‘tronic’ part is not that noticeable either although on standout track ‘…His Queen As Well’ there is a burst of danceable trance etched electronics and the band are also oft to go into dreamy piano-laden moody passages.
Apart from this and the odd intro piece which takes us round to a bible camp meet with a sing along to some Hank Williams as he sees the light this veers more into screamo territories with raging guitars taking sweeps up and down the fretboard and keeping us on our toes around singer and keyboardist Maximilian’s violent yelling. The variety of the music as it goes between raging dynamics and reflective piano parts and even the odd Southern sounding groove is what keeps this one interesting. Having said that, for me the 28 minute running time also helps as this is the sort of stuff I am much happier listening to in small doses and if it had been much longer I doubt I would have coped with it as well.
So for once a short review from me but there isn’t a huge amount to say here. With 28,000 odd friends on their MySpace page Redcraving obviously have a few fans that dig what they do but this is certainly one of those ‘needs must’ reviews for this site rather than one that has us screaming out that we love what the band do.
http://www.myspace.com/redcraving
