THE RIVER OF CRIME: EPISODES 1-5

The Residents 'The River of Crime' is a radio noir play with synth driven music and trys to emulate the 40s crime fiction genre. There are 2 components to this, the performance dialogue of the actual story and the music, which is separated as a second CD if listeners want to hear this without all the talking. I prefer to hear just the music as the dialogue is really only okay heard once. After that we know the story and it is just an irritant. The story was told as a series of 5 podcasts on the net, based on the time honored concept 1940's style radio drama such as Dragnet.

In this story the narrator reveals an obsession with wickedness and is a collector of crime itself, a genuine sociopath. He is fascinated with the electric chair and all it represents as a crime killer, then he has a terrible recollection that adversely affected him. The narrator distances himself from his subjects, but files away like an index bits of crime cases, such as newspaper clippings, along with his personal observations. His life has become one of indulging in crime and the evil that mend do. Eventually it all comes to haunt him as one crime after another seems to just occur before him at a rapid pace. It is as if he is causing the crimes to take place in front of him. Danger ensues from the killers themselves and one may wonder if it is all in the narrator's head and he has become like the subjects he obsesses over ? a killer!

The music is dramatic and cinematic though in places is nothing more than a minimal keyboard. It sometimes makes me wonder listening to these latest Residents albums whether the band is nothing more than one member, as their anonymity allows for this. Devin Townsend has done triple this musical soundscape on his own so it would not be hard to achieve. 2 stars for this oddity.