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[MUSIC] THE SAVAGE ANIMAL
"First Impression of The Dillinger Escape Plan" |
11.30.11 |
BY MIKEY MIGO
Like a broken record, I’ll explain the whole “First Impressions” thing again. Basically it comes down to me listening to a band’s entire studio catalogue and giving an honest first impression of what I hear. Sometimes I love it and that artist becomes part of my collection and I become a huge fan. Then there are times where it just sucks. I want to rip my ears off and I regret taking on this task like one or two albums in. Regardless of preference, I bite the bullet and listen to the entire studio discog and share my honest, and now informed opinion in real time.
Why The Dillinger Escape Plan?
Why not The Dillinger Escape Plan? A few years back I saw then play with Trent Reznor/Nine Inch Nails where they did a few tracks together live. I’m also pretty sure they’ve covered “Gave Up” by NIN, which is a huge perk with me. Also, I know Mike Patton is involved with the project at some point. I don’t want to research too much, but ANY Mike Patton is way better than NO Mike Patton. I still couldn’t tell you anything about this band or list you any of their songs. I’m open-minded though. I mean if Trent Reznor and Mike Patton approve then they can’t be THAT bad, right?
Today I’m listening to the four studio albums they’ve released. I know they’ve put out some other EPs and what not, but I feel like I should be able to get the jist of their style and their work based off the full lengths. Four albums in a row is a long time so for sure I’m going into this with some optimism. As with all these, “First Impressions” I’d much rather spend time with music that’ll inspire me and blow me away than annoy me, bore me, or bring out the meaner side of me.
Let’s do this…
Calculating Infinity
(1999 – 38 minutes) - The debut album opens up with some really fast and chaotic metal and some screams. The thing is though; "Sugar Coated Sour" is still a pretty cool song. It DOES have this stuff, but it breaks down into some really cool melody stuff. The opening of "43% Burnt” is cool and then it breaks down into some stuff that I’ve never really heard before. Really different. The screamy vocals are a little jarring in comparison to the intricate tunes. I’m pretty sure the lead singer is getting raped at the beginning of "Jim Fear". I like the music a lot, but the vocals just don’t fit it. I hope that changes over the progression of these albums. "*#.." starts off with some eerie soundscape stuff that eventually builds into a really aggressive melody. It blends right into "Destro's Secret". This one is a little different in structure. The vocal delivery is less “painful scream” and more chaotic-crazy-chant-rant stuff. It’s not so much as better, but easier for these casual ears to absorb. I have the same response to "The Running Board" as everything else so far. Really interesting music, but the vocals are just too jarring and contrasting. This IS the first point of the album that I found myself head banging a little. So maybe I just need to adapt a little. I really like the ten second breakdown about 1:50 in "Clip the Apex... Accept Instruction". It’s a really cool change up and melody that I think could have been a nice building block to a different track. The title track, "Calculating Infinity", has some really cool music to start us off. It’s almost funky in its down-tempo-ness. I kept waiting for vocals, but they never came. I hate to say it, but I think that’s the reason I like this track most so far. "4th Grade Dropout" brings back the screaming, but it’s passable because of how bad ass the music is. "Weekend Sex Change" is creepy. It sounds like the music you’d hear in a really good horror movie before everyone being killed. It just builds up and builds up as little kid noises and random samples start to pop up. At 2:30 it breaks down into a really mind blowing break beat. We close the first album with "Variations on a Cocktail Dress". It’s more of the same. Oddly placed vocals and extremely cool music. Then a few minutes of silence and then some creepy samples to close us out. I don’t know what I was expecting with this album or this band. I knew I was getting into something heavier than my normal cup of tea. I can generally get into metal, but the screamy stuff and the growl stuff just doesn’t do it for me. I’ll take a singer over a screamer ANY day of the week. I read that this is the only album with this lead singer so I’m going to be optimistic as we move forward because the music composed here is something way before it’s time in 1999. Hell, it’s STILL before it’s time in late 2011.
Miss Machine
(2004 – 40 minutes) - The sophomore full length album kicks off with "Panasonic Youth". In between this album and the last was the EP with Mike Patton doing vocals. Damn. I was hoping it was a full length. New guy’s voice is good though. It’s WAY less jarring. It’s the same kick ass music, but vocals that are pretty much on level. "Sunshine the Werewolf" rocks. It’s a hard track and it makes me want to stomp on things and make mean faces. The vocals are already showing tons more range. You can hear some of the Mike Patton influence in "Highway Robbery". The song structure is something out of his playbook for sure. This is probably the first song of theirs where the structure is more of a common play. It works though. It jumps right into "Van Damsel" with some pretty primal screams. This track seems to be more like the first album that the others so far. Just more polished. I really enjoyed the slower burn and atmosphere set on "Phone Home" and then we get some really solid vocals. He breaks into screams, but the fact that it has other vocals already to contrast them to I think the screams mean A LOT more. I’m sure it’s not surprising that I’d say this is clearly my favorite song of the discog so far. "We Are the Storm" was iffy with me until around the 2 minute mark when the song transforms into something completely different. I like that little part a lot and want more like THAT. We get just under a minute break in "Crutch Field Tongs", a creepy noise track that builds towards the next tune. "Setting Fire to Sleeping Giants" starts off in a weird place and goes into more of a scream. It’s got a weird tempo and vibe to it. It sort of reminds me of Powerman 5000 in a weird way. Then BAM! The chorus sounds like screamo/emoy pop metal stuff. That’s unsettling. There’s so much going on. Call me sick, but I enjoy the title of "Baby's First Coffin". The song isn’t that bad either. It’s got a chaotic bounce to it that makes you want to dive into a fight. The opening of "Unretrofied" is funky. The gargled vocals kick in, but don’t scream at us so much. The chorus kicks in and it’s a different story. We get some harmony and some solid singing work. The contrast is cool. The bass line grooves. Oh man. Of course the album ends with some screams. "The Perfect Design" sounds like it could have been on the first album but they wanted to wait for better production. It’s not bad, the vocals are definitely better, but it’s not the best on the album. I liked the dozen or two steps forward the band made with this album. The vocals are much better and the music is just as bad ass, but tighter and armed with better production. “Phone Home” is my favorite of theirs so far.
Ire Works
(2007 – 39 minutes) - "Fix Your Face" doesn’t waste any time getting right into it. It’s thrash-thrash-scream-scream. For what it is, it’s good. It’s just a little bit of a disappointment after the last album’s more melodic effort. "Lurch" is another angry thrashy track. I got nothing to say that I haven’t said already. Sticking out like a sore thumb, "Black Bubblegum" is way different. It has an 80’s sleaze metal vibe going on. It’s got a softer groove, but still has some really cool music. I like the electronic sizzle to start off "Sick on Sunday". It then warps into some really intense cyber noise. Eventually some softer and harmonic vocals hit and blend right in. Interesting tune. "When Acting as a Particle" is another sound scapey tune. It sounds like it should be in the score of a movie. It’s really cool and I’m surprised I’m not familiar with it from hearing it in a movie or something. Really cool really short tune. "Nong Eye Gong" is only 1:16 and gets in some serious screams and thrash during that time. Another really cool industrial instrumental in "When Acting as a Wave". It goes right into the opening screams of "82588". The music is really different in "Milk Lizard". I’ve talked about certain tracks before having a funk or groove to them. That’s here. Is this the birth of “chaos funk”? I like that term. It’s a good way to describe the fun my ears are having with this song. The guitars on "Party Smasher" are crazy and pretty much make the song for me. "Dead as History" is a gloomy slow burner. The result is one of the coolest tracks of the album. No screaming, just spattering, singing and harmonizing. Parts of it are amazing and then other parts don’t work for me. Overall, this song seems to be the biggest “chance” taken by the band so far. "Horse Hunter" is so screamy and thrashy that if it were for the change up in the chorus you’d think it was a punk song. It’s a really off-putting mix. Are we getting avant-garde confused with lamely weird again? Yikes. The parts I like overshadow the bad though. That’s always a good thing. Babies cry and we get into a soft groove… must be the closer "Mouth of Ghosts"! The piano instantly brings mental comparisons to Trent Reznor’s work. The build and vocals are a bit trippy. I like it a lot. This album had its share of bad and its share of good. I think the gap between the first album and the second album saw more evolution, but this album is no coaster. There are some interesting tracks on here and some of their risks really pay off.
Option Paralysis
(2010 – 42 minutes) - The most recent album kicks off with "Farewell, Mona Lisa". It goes right into pure adrenaline. It breaks down with a well sung chorus and some really heavy layers of music. It’s intense. The opening break to "Good Neighbor" would be perfect for a wrestler’s entrance music. I’m instantly taken in by "Gold Teeth on a Bum". The music is really different than a normal DEP track. The weird random piano work is interesting. That little tweak alone makes this track one of the stronger I’ve heard. If you were worried there weren’t any harder mosh pit killers then rest assured because "Crystal Morning" fills that void kindly. I feel an aneurism coming on as "Endless Endings" takes my heart racing to a really rapid pace. It might be one the harder tracks the band has put out. Then there are some guitars in there that destroy. The change up is cool too. Really solid track. We get a down tempo journey of calming noise in "Widower". It builds up, but keeps a calming vibe going. It’s a really interesting composition. Intense pulses behind a distant sounding tune. It gets noisier as it goes on, but never strays from that chilled out thing. Wow. Painful screams start us off on "Room Full of Eyes". It’s a louder track, but it’s not hard to follow and decipher. Either that, or I’ve officially tuned my ears to Dillinger Escape Plan. Maybe a little of both. It ends on a cool Mike Patton-y note. I feel like I’m doing something wrong when "Chinese Whispers" hits. It finally breaks and jumps into a solid head nodder. It has a bounce to it that’s fun. "I Wouldn't If You Didn't" opens with screamy chaos. It eventually breaks into MORE screamy chaos. Eventually the noise dwindles down to a halt where we’re met with a really, I suppose I’d say, passionate piano melody. It then goes into a down tempo verse or so and eventually rises to the same screamy chaos that started us out. The album closes with "Parasitic Twins". It sounds like an eerie horror scene at start and breaks into a really gloomy break beat. It reminds me of something you’d hear on the Queen of the Damned soundtrack… or maybe Stabbing Westward. I don’t want that to sound like I’m shitting on it though. I do like it. It’s nothing like anything else. It’s a perfect blend of Trent Reznor and Mike Patton, but with the hard edged chaos that Dillinger Escape Plan brings to the plate. Really bad ass. It’s pretty crazy to say, but the very last track I’m hearing by this band is my favorite. It doesn’t really represent what they do though. It’s REALLY different. For the entire album, I liked it. It had some stale stuff and stuff that wasn’t my cup of tea, but they again stepped more outside of their comfort zone and make the music that I assume robots and machines hear in their most beautiful of dreams. Weird metaphor, I know.
THE VERDICT
(1999– ) - The Dillinger Escape Plan is a great metal band. They’re just not really my cup of tea. I’m not a scream/crowd type of guy. I don’t like it when it sounds like a band’s only goal is to play as fast and as hard as they can. I like the change up, the variety, the substance, the accessible chance to connect to a musician’s art on some emotional level. That said, I did like what I heard. There are portions of their discog where they get away from that stuff and explore other areas. That’s all I can really ask for in a band. A band that knows their sound and tries new things. For better or for worse, I’m always going to respect that. The Mike Patton and Trent Reznor influences are really strong at points. I connected more to the more down tempo, less screamy, tunes. The music is GREAT. Some of the best speed metal I’ve had the pleasure of hearing. They take the idea of speed metal, but they expand it with industrial, jazz, groove, and other musings. I’d listen to The Dillinger Escape Plan ten times over again before I’d want to listen to a Lamb of God. For me, I enjoyed them most when they were trying different things. I’d be down with seeing them live, listening to more, and being open to their future works. I’m just not going to be listening to these guys on a daily basis. If you like screamer metal, but want something on a higher, less “primal”, level then you’ll appreciate this band. I have no problem recommending this band to others. If you haven’t had your own experience with this band yet then I’d say go for it.
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