DOWSING ANEMONE WITH COPPER TONGUE

Kayo Dot's second album is generally speaking a continuation of the wide-open experimentation and unconventional approach to the sound and concepts of music. And while half of the album is a worthy successor it fails to live up to the standard set by the glorious "Choirs" album. It's a tale of two albums in my view. The first three songs, while lacking the surface beauty of the Choirs material, are quite good and definitely worthy of your time and investigation. But it runs out of creative steam about 6 minutes into the 4th track and never recovers. As the last two tracks represent half of the one-hour running time, that's a problem.

"Gemini Becoming The Tripod" firmly establishes another bleak, barren landscape of post-apocalyptic ambient avant-metal. Wretched, tortured vocals writhing in pain with a tension filled chorus of sounds behind them, occasionally the drums and guitars will throw a body against the wall. In my "Choirs" review I mentioned it was like the sound that might fill your ear cavity just seconds before the plane crash, the screams mixed with the blown engines and fuselage torn apart rapidly descending. To try to describe the "feel" of the music I would say "Gemini" is like watching a gun battle in a war scene: the climax spurning furious guitars and rapid fire drumming sounding like an automatic weapon. An exhausting opener. "Immortelle And Paper Caravelle" offers strange minimal sounds before a lone bass guitar arrives with some comforting notes. Soon the noises cease as guitar and drums come in, very relaxed. Then we have some serene vocals with trumpet and violin and we have transformed to beauty from the pain of the first track. After some silence there are tiny guitar chords all alone with a menacing cello coming in and out of the picture. These small, lonesome clean chords wander through the rest of the track with occasionally violin sprites for companionship before the sun sets. "Aura On An Asylum Wall" has very unique sounding piano use in a jazzy sequence with trumpet. Teetering like a drunk on a high wire the song can't really decide where to go but the ride is no less fascinating. Violins and guitars are used as the more stable forces later in even providing brief glimpses of melody. The track slowly begins to constrict as the guitar/violin and bass/drums close and get faster before taking it over the cliff in a metal burst.

"___ On Limpid Form" starts very well with 6 minutes of formless beauty, dark and mysterious, with some nice guitar parts. But with all respect I personally chide them for wasting my time over the next dozen minutes with a repetitive sludge drone section that succeeds at little either emotionally or artistically. I understand that pushing the listener's buttons is admirable in prog but I appreciate it more when the artist is willing to show some compassion for the effort. These minutes are filled with dull, juvenile masturbation of the kind which Driver usually avoids. It was interesting the first time but does he really expect people to listen to this nonsense repeatedly? And people call Topographic Oceans pretentious? "Amaranth The Peddler" recovers a bit with some interesting guitar and drumming but I can't help but feel he has run a bit dry on ideas at this point. After the previous 18 minute track the 14 minutes here feel like stretched too thin. Much of the track is very minimal, just quiet spaces with delicate guitar touches. This kind of track can be rewarding but this is not the best example of the style I've heard.

If you are new to Kayo Dot I would strongly suggest starting with "Choirs of the Eye" before trying this album. It (Choirs) is more successful at what it attempts and significantly more appealing in my experience. That said, the first half of this one alone is enough to get 3 stars. I just wish they had released the first three songs as an EP

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