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Versione 2
Rating:
Do not be misled by blastbeat and heavy guitars: the greatest merit/flaw of the crazies from Simi Valley has always been that untamable sugary soul, blatantly kitsch and radio-friendly. After all, they have never made any secret of their pop lifeblood: Jason Cruz regularly praises the Beatles and Sixties surf.
The real problem is to control, tame this nature, avoiding it spiraling into intolerably catchy tunes or other notoriously tacky absurdities. Exile In Oblivion manages this only partially, marking an intermediary transition after the crossover turn of the excellent "The Element of Sonic Defiance" and the good "An American Paradox."
The album in question (I’ve been dreaming for years to write "in question") records Strung Out's desire to define a new and original sound, a meticulous trademark far from the pop-punk echoes of their beginnings: a certainly commendable intent, but unfortunately here still far from being fully realized. Make no mistake, it’s not a bad work, but hailing it as the ultimate of 2004 is definitely a stretch.
The start is breathtaking: the cameo of Elle Fitzgerald is instantly obliterated by the syncopated groove of "Analog," molten lead where sentimentalism flounders in the sixteenth-note neuroses of the most caustic Rob Ramos. You can feel that something has changed, there is a desire to dare. "Blueprint of the Fall" screams it to you, outlawing the terminal preppy idleness of Ten Foot Pole. Jordan Burns’s double pedal is a perpetual tribute to Lombardo and Benante, echoes of Samiam and Naked Raygun blend perfectly in the thrashiest post-hardcore: by the time you reach the countertempo bridge in "Katatonia," you really begin to believe that the five have squared the circle. You think everything is perfect.
And the rest of the CD, for now, does nothing to prove you wrong: the hardcore halfway between thrash and Boysetsfire on "Her Name In Blood" is a fable crashing against the absolutely gratuitous shout of Jason Cruz, who finds his grace in imperfection. The sing-along chorus reaches absurd levels of tackiness, I admit, but there are those who can afford it: this dissonant and dusty shard certainly wouldn’t look out of place in a Tarantino flick à la Grindhouse.
Everything is perfectly studied, down to the smallest detail: even the most tranquil channels offer delightful surprises. "Angeldust" fades into its arpeggios and the fade out of the tail, while "Vampires" cauterizes wounds because then she arrives, the song you’ve been dreaming of for years. "No Voice of Mine." Artificial and alien. Love litanies in binary code. Xenomorphs that sigh life. Hiroshima.
Enough. The toy is broken. It’s true, no one complains when "Anna Lee" resurrects Virginia Madison, but then all good intentions get bogged down in the banal déjà vu that follow, gaudy parodies of the good old days. Matches last 90 minutes. One day Strung Out will learn that. Intoxicated by their pomposity, they produce "Scarlet," which is nothing more than an anonymous ballad without ideas tormented by the most blatant sing-along; a midtempo dragged to oblivion in which Jason performs the task, not knowing where to turn next. The script repeats itself precisely in "Swan Dive," a more or less blatant plagiarism of Pulley that can at best aspire to a poor role as an extra. That's how it is, the second part of Exile. Kitsch reigns supreme. Few ideas and great neglect in the arrangement, which often results in a sterile contest of virtuosity between the rhythm section and the two lead guitars, sure they've already played the winning hand. What’s the point, for example, of changing the rhythm five times in "Never Speak Again," apart from trying to satisfy unbearable "prog" ambitions? And enough with this piano. A piano fade-in and everything permeates with that radical chic vacuity that saves in the corner even the most unlikely ballroom leftovers. "This is so boring! It says nothing." "Yeah, but listen to how they've evolved. I mean, there's a piano."; "Oh, but Yellowcard sucks." "Yes, but feel the evolution. I mean, the piano." Fragments of lived life, indeed.
Strun(g)z are everything and its opposite, and this is perhaps their most representative album, for better or worse. Brilliant pearls followed by outrageous disasters. Of course, their prima donna ambitions are in broad daylight, but I forgive them. They put their faces out there. They took risks. And they ended up with a Pyrrhic victory. But history doesn’t always have to repeat itself. And indeed, 2009 will come soon.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Analog (02:55)
Through the coolest haze
of this dreamlike maze
it has begun
and all I wanted you near
With these wounds I bled
a perfect tone of red
in isolation
through the swollen eyes
Of the dying, and my waking dreams
we're all dying to become what we swore we never would
Now I watch and mourn in bloom
You take the way you know
I'll take the road unknown
and meet you there
at the end of time
We are frequency
we are tragedy
we are the love
we need to keep us here
We are the dying, we are the hungry ones
we are the waiting forever faithful
when I see you on the other side
I will not be the same
as I was when I was yours
How I wanted you near
We are the dying, we are the lonely ones
we are the heartache forever waiting
when I see you on the other side
I will not be the same
as I was when I was yours
We've got the anger, fear and isolation,
exiled to this place.
We've got the pain, separates the tragic years
I've gone through all this waste
and when we finally separate ourselves,
the world we choose to leave behind
I will not be the same
as I was when I was yours.
03 Katatonia (02:46)
impoverished and bleedin' hope here somethin' fast receding dead light holocaust
I check this body in tonight cross my heart and hope to die
to never leave this place alive
im burning right in front of you
break myself against you i lay still
your penetrating glances dead stop all my
vain advances to another place where I can truly be myself
respirators kicked on high
life support keeps me alive
to forgive i will never do
one last kiss is all i need from you
ride salvation goin' under
they say they say I wont survive you now
I wish i never knew you
your name is katatonia
08 No Voice of Mine (02:28)
the wind is shifting, somethings different in the air.
I see it in the form of choices every where
and I've been asleep a lifetime just to wake in time to find...
the voice that has been speaking for me is no voice of mine!
NOW YOU'VE JUST BEEN SPOKEN FOR !
NOW YOU'VE JUST BEEN SOLD !
my eyes fixated on the life I left behind,
a puppet dreams of being human
every time that a string gets pulled before you know, your dancin' to the lie
of someone elses vision of the perfect waisted life...
its in the way we never seem to get it right !
a systematic form of bowin down and under,
and all we know is what we are, without the faith in WHO WE ARE
soo desperate...
something here has gotta give and my instincts fill me with this dread
that I've become what I'm tryin' to kill, that my appetite is my free will...
THERE IS NO RIGHT, THERE IS NO WRONG, THERE IS ONLY THAT IS FOREVER GONE!
09 Anna Lee (03:12)
You hold this place inside my head you're a symphony of hurt
The daylight passes through me To another crippled verse
Been here once before and I know exactly where it ends;
Right back where we started pain dead flowers on the bed
Anna Lee don't you cry for me
You're not as strong as you wanna be
In the dark we all see what we know
It's the space that scares us so
You lead me to your garden where only dead things dare to grow
You convince me I deserve the thorn you've tried so hard to show
Normalness escapes me to the point of no return
The memories around thi place keep us from movin' on
Anna Lee don't you cry for me
You're not as strong as you wanna be
In the dark we all see what we know
Its the space that scares us so The endless balmy air we breathe
This city's startin' to get to me tonight
I'll take the metro anywhere that isn't here
I find the comfort in the pain I always cause...all night
She says she might wait around for me
To come along with a promise and a dream
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