Zitat:Being only twenty-four odd minutes long and comprised of sixteen short interludes and title-less tracks makes this record a difficult one to pick apart. The press release drops JS Bach somewhat pretentiously, or at least recommends this for “fans of” JS Bach (though I can”™t really recall the last time I met a bona fide “fan”)*, but the classical, or classic feeling remains clear. Never has Norway witnessed a band so hellbent on pushing you between two worlds of the extreme, black shadowy roots of metal and the total crack-up of modernization via pure electronic mediation.

In that classical sense it certainly reads as a unified piece with progressive moments/movements rather than an experiment in cut-and-paste sampling. Whether or not the result is something like an epic journey through the castles of Dragon Quest, it is a sound that could be historically situated in Japan”™s economic recession of the 90”™s, upheavals in art and literature characterized by an influential eerie, apocalyptic, anonymous and apolitical quality– I”™m thinking everything from noise-artist Merzbow, to writer Ryu Murakami, to director Takeshi Miike. It”™s no wonder then, the record”™s similarities to contemporary Japanese bands, the first time I saw Next Life”™s Hai Nguyen Dinh perform at Spasibar it reminded me of a more serious version of the gameboy wizard DJ Scotch Egg, and the spastic/chaotic qualities of Melt Banana, as well as that sludgey, epic riffing we all love of Zeni Geva. And maybe that”™s why the record sounds somehow current, like it”™s something we all relate to- divine detachment in an over-sensory, technology-driven world.

The album kicks-off with a low-pounding plummet into their version of a lost age, which is hardly organic as it is industrial, quickly making its way through fantastical territory, fleeting moments of grandiose organ-like reprises over beats at Aphex Twin-speed and groovey rock moments akin to Amp Rep”™s Hammerhead. Halfway through the record, and 3/4 the way again, we hear a krafty melodic keyboard interlude, like some reminder of the humane and naive”¦ but each time follows a build-up of earnest, hard-hitting rock akin to Ministry, with an intense blast beat climax and head-nodding riffs. It almost seems possible to “begin” the record at any point, and loop it through until your original point of entry– so mechanical and crammed-packed the ebb and flow that you definitely feel you”™re getting a whole lotta rosie for only twenty-four minutes.

And so rare a status Next Life have as originators of their own sound, that I would highly recommend grabbing this record at Tiger or from Fysisk Format before the next teenage simulacrum decides to repackage it as their own. ”™Cos then you could do the whole “been there, done that” routine, and so on and so forth, right?

Zitat:<Wizz21>wenn ich so ne mucke hören will, schnapp ich mir meinen c64, schmeiss ihn zwei - oder dreimal gegen die wand, starte ein spiel und fertig is...