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Rating:
"Miss machine" represented a shift towards more experimental shores (even though the previous EP had already given us numerous glimpses of this), but no one ever expected an album like "Ire works."
Many expected an album in the classic ultra-technical and ultra-fast math core style. Instead, the boys delivered a Mathcore album, but one rich in influences that I'll now explain to you. When the CD came out, I didn't immediately place it in the player because I was afraid of being disappointed given my numerous expectations. When I finally decided to listen to it, here's what happened.
Ready? Go!
The opener "Fix Your Face" is very much in the classic style for those who already know these guys; the track showcases both the technical qualities and the sound wall of this group. The second track "Lurch," in terms of songwriting, is truly astonishing and very "progressive-oriented." For those who have seen them live, they know the DEP can faithfully reproduce the tracks even while moving like madmen, leaving the audience in awe, truly. Returning to the album, there are definitely tracks in the classic DEP style, but as you go through the tracks, something happens that leaves us nothing short of amazed. Here we are at the third track, and this is what I wanted to get to. The track in question is called "Black Bubblegum" and it's a somewhat unusual piece for DEP, essentially a pop-rock track with industrial shades. It's here that you see the genius of this group, namely being able to blend a difficult genre like MathCore with practically everything. One of the greatest masterpieces of genius is the next "Sick on Sunday," a truly stratospheric piece that mixes electronics in pure Aphex Twin style with insane distorted guitars. After a very suggestive interlude, we have another piece in pure MathCore style, very similar to the tracks of the previous album, "Miss Machine," called "Nong Eye Gong," where again, the songwriting is excellent, especially the bridge of the song is very well done. "When Acting as a Wave" is another electronic interlude with very industrial shades that truly leaves us speechless and stunned, until it reaches "83588," a beautiful and very heavy track that at the end flows into the most classic jazz. We come to one of the most representative pieces, surely "Milk Lizard," a very pop piece but also very rock n' roll where you can even hear a piano and trumpets; it’s truly absurd, as absurd as the video made for the piece. After this, we have another more classically math piece which is "Party Smasher," very well-structured but also somewhat "filling" compared to the others. "Dead as History" is another gem; here we are very into Industrial Rock/Metal territory, this track is really beautiful and especially capable of evoking a very nocturnal and suggestive atmosphere. We are almost at the end with "Horse Hunter," a Math Core piece that at the end leads into a truly engaging melodic chorus that stays in your mind. And here we are at the end, with one of the best endings an album can have, in my opinion, and that is "Mouth of Ghost," a purely jazz track through and through where the piano is literally carried by the magnificent drumming. A truly magnificent track, one of the best of the album without a doubt, which at the end, just to change things up, changes its face completely.
In summary, an almost perfect album! You hear electronics, then pop rock, industrial, mathcore again, and with the last track even jazz. These guys have not allowed themselves to be really limited by anything; the impression is precisely that DEP have put into this album everything they wanted. If in the previous album, more space was left for heaviness rather than experimentation, here the opposite happens and all of this is fantastic. Genius riffs, elements of electronic music (in Milk Lizard, you can even hear trumpets) full jazz-style drumming (the drummer has changed) blended divinely as only they could do. The credit, in my opinion, goes to the previous EP with Mike Patton (even before Miss Machine) where, in my opinion, Mike had a great influence on DEP especially regarding the electronic parts. In fact, we also have a track in full Aphex Twin style that leaves us truly amazed. Mike Patton, in my opinion, had a great influence on them, with Calculating Infinity (the first album still in classic math style), they were still stuck to pure metalcore without venturing too much, it is with "Irony is a dead scene" that experimentation is instead given free rein. Surely in my opinion one of the best releases of 2007 for one of the most innovative bands of recent years that surely at the level of genius can keep company with bands like Tool or Mastodon, even if infinitely different from the latter.
My advice is to listen to this album calmly and numerous times; only then will you be able to fully appreciate it because it certainly isn't easy to assimilate. These young guys are without a doubt among the best proposals of recent years. I don't want to imagine what they will propose with a possible new album, but it certainly won't be something for purists of the genre. This album is, yes, experimental, but at the same time, it is damn True!
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Fix Your Face (02:41)
You want a vision you can't have / A line that you can't walk / Writhing around on the floor / You won't be aware 'til it's too late / Cause you never look around / You're like a deer in the headlights baby / Queen of delusion you will never learn compassion / Start a fire and you can never put it out / You're burning up in the blaze you started / I want to see you face down / Because I know that you play that part so well / At our wake the casket is open ready for the viewing / But we are still moving / Already we smell of rot / There will be no comeback / No coming back for any one of us now / No way out / Don't you realize there is nowhere you can hide / Where I'm from there is never a rest for the hunted / No way you and I will ever be done / We're never apart / Whatever you're doing / We will always cross your mind / You were young and now you pay the price for her
02 Lurch (02:03)
I don't know your name from my window
Do you lust for fame or forgiveness?
Well I'll give you everything you want
Well I'll give you everything you need
You won't be perfect so best to freeze you in this state go on home you shouldn't be walking around on this day
Now you've stuffed your throat
You've walked on your burial ground
Oh you'll draw the crowd
With honey porcelain skin and crystal baby blues
You picture in my pocket I'm obsessed with you
Oh sweety there's no sense in crying you're above them all
Barricade the door you can hold my hand for comfort when you fall
You wear your skin so fresh
Your smell intoxicates
Little starlet
03 Black Bubblegum (04:04)
Got so much salt from your lies poured into me
You didn't see yourself dead already
So full of with every breath that you breathe
But you forgot that in your fairy tale I'm the wolf
All this attention got you thinking that you're a queen
You think that everything you're doing isn't a dream, long as it feel alright.
I had gotten frozen by the way that you walked, by the love that you gave, by that look on your face
It's a coverup
I know everything
[x2]
You're made for four letter fame
Regret is part of your name
There's something you couldn't tell
It's what you wanted to feel
It's what you're dying to feel
Check out your face on the wall
Like what you see?
I'm sure you see yourself oh so unique
You're just a sucker for the flame of the week
But you forget that in your fairy tale bitch I'm the wolf
All this attention got you thinking you we're a queen
You thought that everything in life you want should be free
Nothing is what you think
I had gotten frozen by the way that you walked, by the love that you gave, by that look on your face
It's a coverup
I know everything
[x2]
You're made for four letter fame
Regret is part of your name
There's something you couldn't tell
It's what you wanted to feel
It's what you're dying to feel
[x5]
04 Sick on Sunday (02:10)
I could never have
Standing here with you
One regret
One Mistake
Nothing we could do
After this is done
You can go your way
Don't forget
This is how
Everything should be
Don't you ever go
06 Nong Eye Gong (01:16)
Now
You laugh forever you laugh
The winner and the best man
Corrupter
Shapeshifter
Your voice is the sound of nothing
Butcher of every artform
Peddler of deceit
Watching the hour hand drag
Destroyer of the past
We're smart enough to say we're sorry
Not smart enough to start again
Dancing in death's illusion
The pride before the fall
Candy for the children
Give it to them all
08 82588 (01:56)
Fallen angel how you've changed
Poison runs through your veins
You were never a saint but now you're a sin
Spoiled rotten from within.
Who clipped your wings so useless?
Cut them yourself?
Chewed off your own?
Good thinking
You were coming apart and I thought I could help you
Through the fever.
Not the first one,
Not the last one,
I'm not sorry for you.
I remember a time when everything that you knew I thought I already knew in my mind
And I thought you knew the same
I know the truth will set you free
Cracked and crazy baby.
09 Milk Lizard (03:55)
My thick tongue hangs down low to the ground,
Licking up the sweat coming off of her heels,
She wants my teeth to wear,
She wants my hell to bear.
Well missy it's a lock for a load,
If you wanna grind hips don't do it alone,
Don't save no dance no not for me,
Just cut me out.
You crept up like a disease looking like a girl only trying to be saved,
Your heart was trying to bleed and you're taking the right road if you're talking to me.
Well you thought you'd tear my skin from bone,
Just cause it was cold and you needed a coat,
Don't tease me just start digging the hole start digging.
Oh you're getting so sleepy tonight,
And you wanna go home but you don't have a ride,
No time just taste won't touch for free,
My salt you're sweet.
You crept up like a disease looking like a girl only trying to be saved,
Your heart was trying to bleed and you're taking the right road if you're talking to me.
And you were there,
And I was every question that never had an answer,
I see right through you,
We never even noticed that,
There always was a reason,
That we were never meant to be left alone.
My thick tongue hangs down low to the ground,
Licking up the sweat coming off of her heels,
She wants my teeth to wear,
She wants my hell to bear.
Well missy it's a lock for a load,
If you wanna grind hips don't do it alone,
Don't save no dance no not for me,
Just cut me out.
And you were there,
And I was every question that never had an answer,
I see right through you,
We never even noticed that,
There always was a reason,
That we were never meant to be left alone.
This feels like neverending,
This feels like neverending,
This feels like neverending,
This feels like neverending,
This feels like neverending,
This feels like neverending,
This feels like neverending,
This feels like neverending.
10 Party Smasher (01:56)
You are only the faded star of my design
Junked out lost potential and crazy from your questions answered
Walk forth
You're the fulfillment of a fallacy
A creature from a fantasy
Don't think that you ever knew me
Don't you ever see
We are forever entwined stuck in a play we can't get out of
Don't you ever see
Won't you ever see
You and i will never be able to end this
We are forever entwined stuck in a play we can leave
You say someday we can start up again
Without a plan no sign of the pressure
I say you're crazy
I hope you see my face in the mirror
You will never learn
You're forever dead to me
Won't you ever see
Your shadow?
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Other reviews
By Divodark
In my humble opinion, the album has it all. It is aggressive and sweet, schizophrenic and melodic.
'Milk Lizard' first assaults you until exhaustion then surprises you with a melodic part that becomes almost moving in the end. Truly beautiful.
By RobyMichieletto
The Dillinger Escape Plan came close to failure, not having succeeded in making all this concrete, nor having given it a complete sense.
By giving up parts of 'massive sonic explosion' and 'intrinsic danger' they took on a responsibility that backfired.
