music reviews
media reviews
mel's rant
lancelot links
he's big! he's huge! he's
he's big! he's huge!
current issue
the dusty archives
write me, baby
click and go! Live shows: Black Lung; Action Adventure Systems; CD Reviews: Dead Voices on Air, Piss Frond; Dream Into Dust, No ManÕs Land; Dystopia One, The Buscemi Tapes and Sold-Out!*; Fear Factory, Obsolete* ; Front 242, :re:boot: [Live Ō98]; Ikon, This Quiet Earth* ; Kidney Thieves CD single;* Pigface,Below the Belt; Project Pitchfork, Steel Rose; Sepultura, Against*; SMP, Ultimatum*; Turk Knifes Pop, Performance Crippling Data Restriction; VA, Amduscias; VA, Electropolis Vol. 1
*reviewed by Mungo & Henrey
Front 242, :re:boot: [Live Ō98]
Live recording from Brussels in early 98. Has everything you ever wanted, every big hit you danced to back in the day: Headhunter, Welcome to Paradise, Soul Manager, Punish Your Machine... in versions that differ every so slightly from the various studio recordings. Very clean, loud without distortion, perfect perfect perfect. Makes me regret not seeing them last time around, but thatÕs another story...
metropolis records
official Front 242 site
Fear Factory, Obsolete
Mungo: who is listening to this stuff?Henrey: I like it. ItÕs like if the Ramones grew up and got brains. They have an interesting take on the whole technology issue. I mean, they utilize it musically, but lyrically they struggle against the inhumanity of technocracy. I also like the dichotomy of using violence to bring about peace, a theme that occurs time and time again in songs like Edgecrusher and Hi Tech Hate. TheyÕre not against violence per se, only the violence the oppressors use on the oppressed to keep them down. Of course, the highly aggressive Fear Factory sound only further emphasizes the use of violence to topple our oppressors, be they man or machine, or in some case, ourselves. ItÕs good to hear that there are people out there working within the confines of popular ŅrockÓ music who are concerned with larger themes like human condition, as opposed to oh, my girl broke up with me and IÕm having a bad day. I also applaud the fact that there are no dance-hall style raps on this disk, no fake ska or reggae.
Mungo: Maybe IÕd like it better if they had a song about vomit.
Roadrunner
Electropolis Vol. 1
Metropolis compilation with new songs by Front Line Assembly, Informatik, Terminal Sect, Necrofix and Haujobb and remixes of songs by Numb, Mentallo and the Fixer, Thinkingman, Funker Vogt, EvilÕs Toy, Snog and more. For me, what makes this a must-have-double-bag-item is the German lyric version of :Wumpscut:Õs Soylent Green.
metropolis records
Project Pitchfork, SteelRose mcd
I go back and forth as to whether I dig these guys or not, but after listening to the various versions of SteelRose a few times I realized that I liked it. ItÕs a really infectious, catchy song! Which is so not what I expect from these guys. Three listens in I discovered I didnÕt care that there were six different versions of the song (remixed by Patrick Codenys and Daniel B. of Front 242, talla 2xlc, apoptygma bezerk...) SteelRose is much more sophisticated, lyrically and musically, than previous Pitchfork songs. Angels, the other song on the disk, is much more like old-school Pitchfork, dealing with traditional Pitchfork themes like god, beauty, space aliens...
metropolis records
Kidney Thieves, s+m (a love song) CD single 
Mungo: ItÕs like Tool with a girl singer! I like that! Girls dig me. I bet I could get her to pet me for hours.
Henrey:I donÕt like those dentist drill noises. ItÕs disturbing. Did you see the flyer?
Mungo:About what do to if someone actually steals your kidney? That was funny! Does that happen?
Henrey:Urban legend. I call bullshit on that.
Mungo:Figures. All the coolest stories are apocrypha...
Push Records
Dystopia One, The Buscemi Tapes and Sold-Out!
Mungo: I always start. Why donÕt you start this time?
Henrey: OK. Steve Buscemi. HereÕs a piece of apocrypha for ya. Everyone mom knows knows Steve Buscemi.
Mungo: Is that true?
Henrey: Not quite. But close enough. Steve Buscemi is the most important actor of our time! When they make the story of my life, I want Buscemi to play me. I know itÕs a stretch, but I think heÕs up to the task.
Mungo: Henrey? did you know that youÕre a cat? anyway... Covers on Buscemi Tapes include The Sesame Street Song and the RamonesÕ Pinhead! And thereÕs a song about vomit!
Henrey: They also cover a Napalm Death song, Multi-national Corporations and that terrible Mean at Work song...
Mungo: (singing)who can it be now? IÕd describe DysOne for ya kids, but they sort of defy description. Whaddya think, Hank?
Henrey: I guess IÕd say theyÕre like if Megadeth had Black Francis writing their songs and they all grew up at a year-round vacation bible school and ate too many cheese dogs...
Mungo: Cheese dogs definitely. Hence the Spastic Colon Kidney Stone Blues. What about this 3-song tape? Sold-out!?
Henrey: Love songs, Mungo. Nothing but love songs. Love songs in the catheter-in-your-urethra mode.
Mungo: This doesnÕt have anything to do with the Kidney Theives, does it?
dystopia one disinfo
None of the Above Music
Ikon, This Quiet Earth
Mungo: This says ŅIf Igo and lead myself astray...Ó WhoÕs Igo?
Henrey: I think itÕs a typo. ItÕs like Ōmoops.Õ
Mungo: I demand to know who Igo is! Mungo must know! BTW, Hanky, I like this. This is the sort of soft romantic melancholy stuff you play when you have a goth girl come over and you want her to think youÕre all sensitive and depressed. Then you can make your move and they never know what hit em...
Henrey: IÕd rather play Cro-mags and take Ōem by surprise. And donÕt call me Hanky.
Mungo: How about Mr. Hanky?
metropolis records
SMP, Ultimatum
Mungo: Hey! These guys live where momÕs boyfriend lives!Henrey: That must be some crowded apartment
Mungo: When we move out there we can go hang with these guys. They seem pretty cool. The music is sinister and captivating... and thereÕs a chick!
Henrey: I adore women. Wait... waddya mean when we move out there...
Mungo: Oh. Maybe youÕre not coming. Forget I said anything. Anyway. This sounds a lot like one of momÕs favorite Seattle bands, Noise Box. Very beaty and noisy, staticky.. and little like one of her other favorite bands, sexwithsarah, seductive, sneaky... cool-ass samples...
Henrey: IÕm always the last to know!
Catastrophe Records
SMP home
zenflesh five, Amduscias, VA
Noise, ambient, weird relaxing and jarring music by mike czech, rh yau, job, flapper, aerobics king, noise/girl, shiva speedway, ipecac loop and more. The ŅthemeÓ of this compilation is that all the compositions had to be under five minutes, which you know is difficult for alot of these more experimental acts. For me it makes things much easier to digest...
zenflesh records
Pigface,Below the Belt
The best, the weirdest, the most intriguing. the most consistently good Pigface disk yet. The remix CD of A New High in Low features such luminaries as Curse Mackey of Evil Mothers, Justin Broadrick of Godflesh, Bagman, Sheep on Drugs and my faves James Galus (a/k/a DJ St James of Click and Drag) and the ever-fabulous Hanzel und Gretyl who make a quite a dessert with Nutopia. I love the way each Pigface disk is so drastically different from the previous ones, yet all seem to fit together. Atkins manages to move each one forward in a natural progression without ever relying upon the gimmicks so many other electronic bands rely on. Alls I can say about this is each Pigface disk is such a huge happy surprise and I hope Martin Aktins keeps this going for a long long time...
invisible records
Dream Into Dust, No ManÕs Land
I was expecting some sort of morbid dreary moans to emit from the speaker when I threw this on but instead got some cool industrial-like beats, then the goth song, then a scary ambient/poetry track... this is pretty varied considering itÕs only got four songs. They were featured on a Franz Kafka tribute disk, so these guys is aces in my book.Chthonic Streams
Turk Knifes Pop, Performance Crippling Data Restriction
Pretty and insidious. Features the Pookah right on the sleeve, so you know someoneÕs trying to tell you something. I think Turk Knifes Pope is designed to lull you into a hypnotic state so you can accept the subliminal messages that may or may not be imbedded somewhere within these tracks. I may be totally wrong on this. If so, IÕm sorry for spreading rumors.
zenflesh records
Dead Voices on Air, :piss frond:
YouÕre gonna have to forgive me for being plebeian and stupid, but this is definitely by far my favorite DVOA disk yet, because it has songs in a structure I can understand! IÕm not all that musically sophisticated, and IÕll admit right here and now that some of the past DVOA stuff just lost me. But this! I love it. ItÕs got melody, rhythm... I know, IÕm an idiot. This is a 2-disk set (for the regular price, btw), so there is lots of old-school DVOA stuff for you intellectual purists to ruminate on.
invisible records
dead voices on air
Sepultura, Against
Mungo: This is Sepultura Mach 2Henrey: Jazz Oddessey?
Mungo: DoesnÕt sound like jazz... The brother left. What happened?
Henrey: IÕm not sure. DidnÕt he go to law school?
Mungo: No! ThatÕs MelpieÕs brother! So, does this sound like Sepultura?
Henrey: I donÕt know! It sounds like what I thought theyÕd sound like, so, yeah, I guess so. ItÕs loud and has raspy devil vocals. Did you know these guys were Brazilian?
Mungo: Huh! Do they know how to lambada?
Henrey: Seems unlikely. They may samba, however. I wonder if MaxÕll come back when Sex Farm hits no. 1 in Japan...
Mungo: ThatÕs Spinal Tap! Not Sepultura! So, whaddya think?
Henrey: I can get into it. ItÕs really Riki Rackman, ya know what IÕm saying? It puts me in the mind of going to get some tattoos. Big skulls and microchips, bar codes...
Mungo: YouÕd have to shave!
Henrey: Oh. Forget it then. What do you think, Mung Bean?
Mungo: Maybe IÕd like it better if they had a song about vomit.
Roadrunner