Foetus
Gash

Campaign of the Ministries of Health and Youth Policies: there's a drug that comes from Australia, it's pure, it's uncut, IT'S NOT FOR EVERYONE. Attention, if you are just an occasional consumer of good music, DON'T DO IT. DON'T DO FOETUS.

Listening to Foetus cannot help but be an experience. In most cases, a distracted and irresponsible listen will provoke only one reaction: rejection. Usually, one listens to something new for its similarity to what they are currently hearing or on someone else's recommendation. In the case of Foetus, such recommendations must consider how one intends to immerse themselves in one of the most original musical universes of the twentieth century. If you are fearless, you can explore this world chronologically, from the first works onward; in this case, the experience will be equivalent to an alienated Dantean journey, from which one emerges corrupted and irrevocably changed. However, if you want to learn to swim before diving into the darkest depths, "Gash" is certainly the most suitable approach. This album is not Foetus's masterpiece, but it is an exceptional collection of tracks, showcasing the compositional abilities of an artist who has now subdued his more violent and schizophrenic inclinations. Thirlwell indeed no longer feels the need to use music as an outlet for his most irrational urges; instead, a certain complacency is now seen in creating tracks, certainly less spontaneous but still extraordinary.

It is impossible to ascribe Foetus to a genre, and "Gash" is no exception. It's also difficult to associate it with 1995, as the album shows not even a wrinkle and given the plurality of sounds it contains, from which more acclaimed artists (like Mr. "Trout" Reznor) have drawn, borderline plagiarism, for "works" defined as "ahead of their time" (e.g., Year Zero).

The album opens with Mortgage, a splendid electronic blues, granite in its progression and sprinkled with Oriental influences, which constitute a recurring leitmotif in "Gash". They are followed by the speed sound and the "copshootcop-esque" trumpets (not surprising with Ashley in the lineup...) of Mighty Whity and the degenerate country-rock of Friend or Foe. With Hammer Falls, we reach the first peak of the album; a kaleidoscopic and whirlwind track that blends (as if Sister Germana herself did), Indian suggestions and pure rock, subdued tones and liberating shouts, trumpets, guitar riffs, and samples. A small drop in style occurs with Downfall, whose chaos seems a bit too "constructed", but the evocative Take It Outside, God Boy gets back on track, with its "Lawrence of Arabia" atmospheres broken by Foetus's degenerate shout and the trumpet peeking through the distortions. The "nine-inch-pop" of Verklemmt and the insipid They Are Not So True pass without leaving a mark, while the swing of the '30s in Slung, with its rogue small orchestra, is pure Foetus. We then reach another peak of the album, constituted by the industrial, somewhat sneaky power of Steal Your Life Away and especially by the extraordinary Mutapump, where Wagnerian sounds (just slightly Arabic) culminate in a devastating and liberating sound cavalcade, forming the tragic pinnacle of the album. The chaotic yet unnecessary See Ya Later closes the album, marking perhaps the most noticeable discordance, given that Foetus was accustomed to much more "substantial" finales.

The work that emerges in the end testifies to the genius of an artist who, despite having already shot his best rounds, does not give up making music without risking stylistic falls that would put what he has done well in the past at risk. "Gash" is, in any case, just a business card; a taste of a much longer journey into the hell of Foetus. A hell where the Devil is a cynical cabaret performer, and the bolges are simultaneously places of damnation and excessive entertainment. You choose the final circle. But then, who knows if you'll really want to go down....