Ducks Battle Satan

The way some people crap on about this record you would think it is the second coming of Christ. Throbbing Gristle have reformed after 25 years. How fucking exciting. Their back catalogue has certainly not aged that well so here is their opportunity to become relevant to the noise generation. Do they get away with it? Yep…. well for the most part.

Let’s talk about the crushing disappointments first. Three of the first four tracks are pretentious, skin crawling bullshit. The first track Vow of Silence is a sub standard industrial track that goes thud thud thud, thud thud thud and Genesis P. Orridge drivels over the top with vocals that initially sounds like a gibbon high on crystal meth before giving way to a dreary little excuse for a noise track. Thud thud thud, thud thud thud. Heard it all before I’m afraid. The next track is a fucking joke. Rabbit Snare is a smoky, jazzy, noir-ish slab of crap. CRAP. Almost a Kiss is almost as bad. No scratch that it is as bad. Almost like the most appalling Crime and the City Solution cover band in the world. Six Six Sixties? Nah, Shit shit shitties more like it. These three startling representations of mediocrity make up Tracks 1,2 and 4 respectively. It’s fair to say that Part Two gets off to a bad start but it gets way better.

Greasy Spoon and Lyre Liar are great slabs of ambient, industrial electronica and well worth the price of admission. Above the Below is great. It’s like Double Leopards in its creepy inevitability. Look I could crap on about how great everything is from Track 5 on but you get the idea. Its ambient, it’s electronic, at times it’s industrial, it’s creepy and it avoids being the catatonic cringe-fest the opening few tracks threatened. Most importantly Part Two is relevant. Throbbing Gristle avoid being a parody of their former selves. Fuck it, their are some excellent moments on this and hands down it has the best closing track of any record I’ve heard for quite a while.

This entry was posted on August 10, 2007 at 10:17 am and is filed under Music, Throbbing Gristle. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.