It is with
music like food; even if everyone around me tells
me that this slice of liver is
prepared in the most exquisite way, I
still can feel the texture of liver which I really don't like. Also, a lot of
people tell me that Dr. Pepper tastes like shit, but you know what? It's my
favourite drink! Tastes vary and the experience, no matter how much some claim
that objectivity is a goal for a reviewer, is entirely subjective. Objectivity
is an illiusion!
I probably shared this before, however just for reasons of clarification, I'll
explain that there is a number of steps I go through when I do reviews:
First I listen and form an immediate opinion.
I listen again.
I take notes on a notepad (oftentimes when I drive and I'm fully aware that I
shouldn't do it, but, hey, this is when I have the time to do it).
I listen again. This I do up to ten times depending on the album.
Then, finally, I write the review whilst listening to the album. Often when I'm
travelling or, as I do right now, sit here lurched in my basement surrounded by
my CD's, LP's, instruments and comic books.
Admittedly, I do some reviews after no more than two listens. This is usually
when I can tell it's just utter shite. This rarely happens, though. And what you
find in my reviews is usually not a description of each song, but more a
description of what my heart tells me about the album in question.
Take the example of the latest album from Mnemic. 'Mnemesis' is a marvellous
album. Technically, that is. I can hear how perfect everything is. Not a single
note in the wrong place. Guillaume sings like a young god. Mircea, the sole
original member left in the band, orchestrates a host of fantastic riffs. It's
all in place.
Does it work for me? In part. To be honest, I'm a bit bored. I miss the madness,
the boyish, we-don't-give-a-shit-what-you-think charm that was part of my
fascination of Mnemic when they burst into the scene partly as a Fear Factory
clone, partly a Soilwork clone back in 2003 with 'Mechanical Spin Phenomena'.
It's long gone. Mnemic left that phase after the second album, 'The Audio
Injected Soul'.
2007's 'Passenger' was a crazy piece with lots of Meshuggah inspiration, almost
too much for me, but still with a madness that caught on. 'Sons of the System'
from 2010 offered a lot of diversity and was all in all quite impressive.
So what's wrong this time, exactly? Overall, I get the Linkin Park feeling more
than I get the Meshuggah feeling when listening to 'Mnemesis'. It's polished.
There are three really, really cool songs on the album; Pattern Platform,
Haven at the End of the World and last tune Blue Desert in a Black Hole. This is
where I can feel the blood pumping. This is where energy is unleashed and the
cylindres are firing.
The rest is all very nice and right and refuses to creep under my hardened skin.
More fire, more unpolished fury, please.
