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Saturday, July 7, 2012

Album Review: The Body - Self-Titled


The Body is a two-piece sludge metal band from Rhode Island, now living in Portland, Oregon. They have just re-released their 7 track self-titled LP, and are now on a west coast tour with Whitehorse, Braveyoung and The Assembly of Light Choir. They originally released their self-titled album on Moganono Records in 2004, it was out of print for years, but now officially available again via At A Loss Recordings.

The album opens like the Flash Gordon soundtrack, super-epic, with a song called- ( ), really innovative musically, particularly within the realm of minimalism. If Glenn Branca conducted Steve Reich through monstrous distortion, it may sound like this. The whole vision of the band is more like a filmmakers than a songwriter. There are long instrumental sections written from a cinematic point of view, rather than a usual song structure, and when there is singing, it’s heavily effected, haunting/deranged and lyrically inaudible. Pure aggression. Though it’s two musicians, simply noted as Lee and Chip, they clearly sound like a bigger band. The guitar experiments with detuned overtones and sustaining fuzz pedals that make you think you’re hearing several guitars. The drummer is an animal, raw and loud from start to finish, switching from metal grooves to hard hitting orchestral crescendos. The overall production of this album is similar to a Steve Albini Shellac record, but even more experimental sonically. At times, you’ll hear a nightmarish piano or what sounds like a cello at the last minute of the record. It’s interesting the way the band goes in odd directions without a warning, but sounds perfectly controlled between the two of them. This is powerful music to see live. I highly recommend revisiting this record, what will surely be considered a classic in the years to come.


2012 Tour Dates:

THE BODY w/ Whitehorse:
7/03/2012 Plan B - Portland, OR w/ Atriarch, Usnea
7/05/2012 The Shakedown - Bellingham, WA
7/06/2012 The Highline - Seattle, WA

THE BODY w/ Braveyoung, The Assembly Of Light Choir:
8/08/2012 Black Lodge - Seattle, WA
8/09/2012 Plan B - Portland, OR
8/11/2012 Oakland Metro (side room) - Oakland, CA
8/13/2012 Sidebar - Los Angeles, CA
8/14/2012 Che Cafe - San Diego, CA
8/15/2012 Blue Star Cafe - Los Angeles, CA
8/16/2012 Pioneer - Santa Cruz, CA

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