Crystal Castles (III) - 2012

Ed note: the album review contains notes on a live show, which was held at The Beacham in Orlando, FL on 16 April 2013.  Crystal Castles took the stage roughly around midnight after opening act Doldrums.

From the outset of Crystal Castles' third self-titled effort, you can tell not everything is right.  Even before listening, the album art invokes some sense of discomfort.  It features a hooded figure shrouded in black except for its maniacal grin--female?--embracing a naked male form.

 The opening track immediately begins with a nightmarish siren of sorts, perhaps signaling some fel beast coming from planes where reality is unstable.  Slowly synths stagger forward methodically, and we hear Alice Glass's voice for the first time.  Here she is lulling, but it's not long before her distorted, airy, distant pseudo-punk vocals begin shouting, almost unintelligble, except for one line: "I AM PLAGUE!"  Almost as if that is the only part of the song we are meant to understand.

Alice Glass is the unquestionable image of Crystal Castles, adorning most all of its merchandise in offbeat ways.  A bloody, Madonna-esque drawing.  As two pink, naked succubi with their tongues lolling.  That image carries onto the stage, with her torn tights and punk boots, thrifted clothing hanging loosely off her gaunt figure.  She drinks directly from a large bottle of vodka in one hand she carries with her frequently, the fiery cherry of her cigarette occasionally flaring up in the dark on stage.

Her performance is littered with her crowdsurfing, while she continues to sing.  It's become a fetish of fans to do everything they can to touch her. When she leaps down, there's a sudden surge of bodies forward in the crowd and it's easy to find yourself completely flattened on all sides, like Kirby.  There's other assorted hijinks that, perhaps, should stay with those who saw that individual show.  Needless to say, Alice is a miscreant.

Ethan Kath, who represents half of Crystal Castles, is less prominent yet equally impressive.  He was honored, along with Alice, together, as the #1 Icons of 20 Years at Lollapalooza.  Live, he is found usually slumped over, tinkering with his keys and nobs and pedals and switches, typically quiet except to occasionally berate the crowd for not being loud enough.

Interestingly, though Kath and Glass both come from punk backgrounds, their contemporary music sounds decidedly electronic: specifically (III).  Certain tracks would make instant dance club favorites, especially one track called "Sad Eyes," whereupon its beginning literally everyone in the crowd started jumping up and down rapidly.  A personal favorite for obvious reasons.

Each song is beautifully cut from the same fabric, customized and woven back together into a beautiful quilt of dark, electronic goodness where dark lords command skeletal stormtroopers, as the landscape slowly fades into a pixellated, poisoned point in the distance.  Faded black, shot through with purple, blue, pink and blinding white.  Banners of false prophets streaming in the wind.

Perhaps the most charming thing to me about Crystal Castles is its refusal to take itself too seriously.  Alice and Ethan make a true spectacle of a show, and played almost two sets when I saw them.  They're a true treat, and to venture sounding like a fanboy, one of my favorite acts.  I often pine to relive the show I saw, a bittersweet feeling.

Post-it note: Doldrums was impressive as the first act, featuring an odd looking frontman who spent most of his time singing using a custom-built suitcase with vocal effects built in it to make himself sound female or terrifying, and anything else he desired.  The band is unique and worth investigating.

Verdict: Epic Win [9.314159.../10]

http://www.crystalcastles.com/

you can't disguise sad eyes

John Milton - Paradise Lost (1667)

“To leave this paradise, but shalt possess/A paradise within thee, happier far.”

Paradise Lost, the 17th-century epic poem containing over ten thousand lines of verse, contains the story of the Fall of Man and expulsion of paradise, along with seemingly endless descriptions of Hell and fire and death.  The theme of the story is to “justify the ways of God to men.”  Milton, though a writer of such fire and brimstone, was noteworthy as a forward-thinking individual, espousing values of education and divorce as a viable option for those who are not compatible.

Influenced by Dante, the then-blinded John Milton penned two epic poems, Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained, during the final decades of his life.  Though creating a vision of “Heaven, Hell and Paradise,” his message sought to discuss philosophic matters such as issues of knowledge, sin, and free will.

The volume is epic in every sense of the word, with biblical prose, and sweeping descriptions of horrible, alien landscapes with lakes of fire, and damned souls.  It explores, seemingly on every page, deceit, redemption, and retribution.

PERSONALITY AND APPEARANCE OF SATAN 

Satan’s appearance, as one might expect, is a terrible one.  Far from the stereotypical cartoonish devil, cherry red, sporting a pointed tail and horns, Satan is depicted as one of incredible size, “midst a horrid vale.” [Paradise Lost 40]  On leathery demon wings, Satan presides over his damned realm filled with spires and a bottom singed with stench and smoke, “such resting found the sole/Of unblest feet.” [Paradise Lost 142-144]  Parallels can be drawn with other dark lords of fiction, such as Sauron from Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings saga, and his plagued realm Mordor.  Also noteworthy is the use of fire in terms of ill will, destruction, and lost hope: perhaps gathered by the age’s fear of fire.  Consider: Paradise Lost was published almost exactly one year after the Great Fire of London in 1666.

WHY DOES ADAM DECIDE TO STAY WITH THE FALLEN EVE? 

Descriptions of why Adam would choose to remain with Eve after betraying God, and Adam are, in a way, not unexpected.  The age-old trope of lovers caught together in a convoluted spiral, most likely doomed, is repeatedly explored.  Adam states though Eve has forsaken God, he would not wish for another partner, even another Eve if God chose to create one.  He stands by her in her sickness of sorts, stating “My own in thee, for what thou art is mine; Our state cannot be severed, we are one, One flesh: to lose thee were to lose myself.” [Paradise Lost 139-141]

Once again, Modern literature clearly referenced these old ideas.  Themes such as these are explored in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, as well as countless other forms of cinema, and storytelling, such as characters Brendan and Em in Rian Johnson’s neo-noir picture Brick.  One line states almost exactly Adam’s sentiment toward Eve, where Brendan yells to his girlfriend Em in a flashback: “You’re the only thing that I love!  You’re the only thing that I love.” 

WHAT MESSAGE DOES THE ANGEL GIVE TO ADAM? 

In Book XII of Paradise Lost, upon Adam and Eve’s expulsion from Paradise, the Archangel Michael is sent from Heaven to deliver a message to the two lovers.  He seems to espouse good values, as ever is preached in religion, and teaches the opening quote of my paper: to find Paradise in one’s heart, not in material values or even a literal Paradise.  The awe-inspiring Michael’s message, in the end, is a positive or perhaps bittersweet one, despite the negative nature of the Expulsion from Paradise.  “That ye may live, which will be many days, Both in one faith unanimous though sad, With cause for evils past, yet much more cheered, With meditation on the happy end.” [Paradise Lost 191-195]

With that, Adam and Eve are expelled from glory by Angels with swords of fire.

The story of Paradise Lost is one that everyone should know.  It explores classic, no doubt prehistoric, themes of love, loss, betrayal, grief, piety, and retribution.  Simple analysis of the text leads one to draw parallels to other works of fiction, evident even works less than ten years old, and certainly works of the future also.  In its haughty Biblical prose contains countless valuable messages, and even awful descriptions that paint a grim landscape on the mind’s canvas.  In Paradise Lost we learn that misconceptions regarding Satan’s appearance warp our view of evil.  True evil, as thought by Milton, is terrible to behold, large, spouting fire from extremities, wheeling in a sadistic, sulfurous realm on dark wings.  Also learned is the fact that even in such a dark tale, positive messages can be found from the mouths of angels.  Finally, that Adam’s reasoning on staying with Eve is unsurprising, and perhaps even expected.

Milton said before his death, “Who kills a man kills a reasonable creature … but he who destroys a good book, destroys reason itself.”  One finds it difficult to think of few better ways Milton could have propagated knowledge, thought, reason, and learning than to write cornerstone work of literature such as Paradise Lost, which has challenged and delighted readers for half a millennia.

“Let us descend now therefore from this top/Of speculation; for the hour precise/Exacts our parting hence …” [Paradise Lost 178-180]

Verdict: [beyond criticism]

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~milton/reading_room/pl/book_1/

Satan's Almighty Penis - Thy Foulness Cum EP (2008)

Witness the edification of the unholy! Three blasphemous tracks of disheveled aural holocaust channeled into loosely structured black metal with streaks of noise and ambiance. This is both the best and worst thing you will hear this Christmas. And there has been no greater evidence that Iowa, is in fact, the gateway to Hell. And you thought it was Las Vegas!

The EP opens with the devastating "Sacrifyx", bludgeoning busts of buzzsaw blade chords and speed lines intermixed with the horrific vocals of Syntax Function A. "Leper Apocalypse" is more metal in the face, though the noise still flows around the driving daemonic riffs and tortured screaming. This is serious fucking business:

O rich man in his tower
The holy bastard in a church
Starving wretch in his hovel
In death, all men are equal

The third and final track, almost four minutes in actual length, is "Scarred With Human Life", which boasts a different production, and is more of a straight black metal tune, and a decent, primal one at that. This third track does break into a somber, doom-like phase which is glorious like the death of all humanity.

This is actually a pretty enjoyable EP if you have less than 10 minutes to kill and you want to listen to a foul abberation of black metal and noise, which is both sadistic and entertaining. Having no exposure to their previous full-length Into the Cunt of Chaos, I can't draw any comparisons. Apparently this was recorded back in 2006. Hail Iowa. And hail Satan's demonhood.

Verdict: Win [7/10]

http://www.satansalmightypenis.org/