Review Summary: Twisted circus, where the joke is jester's life - and you can't help but laugh with him.
It's not that often I get to listen to an artist that I have little to no knowledge of from any of the music media I consume, so when my friend sent me the album cover of the jester covered in black ink and said it's produced by Trent Reznor, I couldn't help but be deeply interested. Coming from the new wave scene after long years in Kevin McMahon's previous project, Lucky Pierre,
Prick is an unusual mix of industrial rock, new wave, post punk and glam rock.
And fortunately, it works out in his favour.
Prick shows a huge amount of experience with songwriting and a playful, almost Bowie-like vocal style, which mixed with Reznor's hand in production creates theatrical, fluid yet mechanical feel to the tracks. That's especially audible on the tracks such as
Other People and the opener
Communiqué, where tin can guitars energetically struggle against the noisy samples, driving drums and, in case of the former, twisted, creepy synths(the chorus especially is extremely reminding of Reznor's previous works
Broken and
The Downward Spiral ). All that while remaining joyful, in face of the genre often coupled with feelings of despair, pain and depression because of those very albums. That's not to say it doesn't deal with serious subjects, such as alcoholism, forcing religion on children and overcoming internal struggles, but rather than crumbling under them it faces them with a smirk on its face.
On
Animal and
Crack , we get to hear the origin of Prick – the human, where the former shows synth pop with only a tinge of heavy guitars, which is what the latter track specializes in. Both also showcase a solid, tight rhythm section, ready for any of the 90's alternative dance clubs. But it's not all muscle here, as the two ballads present provide a needed breathing room, and in case of the song
Makebelieve, a satisfying conclusion to the record.
With an exceptional amount of personality in the short vocal performance,
I Aplogize, as well as previously mentioned
Communiqué and
Animal also show off the hit potential for the record, with all of them offering extremely catchy choruses and memorable lines.
You found a garter belt on my nose, I warned ya
My similar similarities lose touch when I drink to much
But bye bye, I kiss the bottle goodbye, forever
I know it's made a fool of me, I'll try to reconcile
And I apologize for being cruel
When I should have been kind
The album isn't free from hiccups, though they're rather minor and usually made up for with other parts of any given track(and really, there isn't any single track I'd leave of the album).
Riverhead drags a little in the verses, even more so being placed so early on in the album, but then the almost trip-hop bridge and the coda make up for any sour feelings, and almost the same could be said for
No Fair Fights, in case you aren't feeling the slower numbers.
In conclusion, the album offers a theatrical, charismatic and joyful industrial rock with very little wrong on the whole record, great vocal performance and songwriting from Kevin and all that is packed in a production by Trent Reznor in what some would call his peak.
What's there not to love?
