SPLEEN AND IDEAL

The cold wave tendencies of their debut have been tempered somewhat, but this still sounds like the sort of music dead people might make love to. That is, as long as I am living I'm not likely to take too much interest. Unfortunately, while the prior album's strongest aspects were in the ambient realm, and "Spleen and Ideal" gravitates even more to that corner, DCD has failed to improve on the formula. Perhaps it was a case of looking good by comparison only.

Very little here suggests the group's potential, let alone the possibility that it would ever be fulfilled. The exceptions would be the almost ethereal "Mesmerism", that ironically might have been better with the percussion lower in the mix. and the compelling "Avatar", in which the band sounds like HEART awakening from a decades long sleep in a decidedly morose frame of mind. But when the group attempts a similar score with Perry on the vocals, as in "Enigma of the Absolute", it sounds a little too much "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" on a less colorful non prescriptive formula. "Cardinal Sin" and "Advent" confirm that they are not yet in the business of writing appealing hooks, never mind building songs around them. I hear minimalist tendencies but the basic motifs are too amorphous and yet simultaneously too rhythmically based to receive high grades in this arena. As before, the mix of the vocals and instrumentation is sub par, with no synergy whatsoever

I am not venting my spleen or spewing bile, but admit to lacking the intestinal fortitude to abide "Spleen and Ideal" any further.