Review Summary: ugh
It’s a bit disappointing to see Koufar (a.k.a. Mackenzie Chami) sell his soul to the “demon” of modern gentrified power electronics. Sure, I guess there’s a bit of merit to this idea of destruction and reinvention of ethos; especially when considering the futurist and “neo-punk” ideologies upon which noise and power electronics were founded, but somehow there’s become this idea that “reinvention” equals “dilution”. The anti-conformist, hyper-confrontational bent of power electronics has been replaced with a kind of “intellectualised” pop-ification. It’s not necessarily a new thing, but over time it has grown from being a bit of a pitchfork pipe-dream to a fully-fledged movement; to the point that the Scatmothers of the world are now few and far between, meanwhile the Prurients, Puce Marys and post-2016 Koufars are a dime-a-dozen.
I say it’s disappointing 1) because it is a further step towards the death of the original power electronics ethos, and 2) because it’s all too apparent that the stylistic shift is an uncomfortable one for Chami. The once prominent politicoreligious themes of Chami’s work are now well and truly subdued; the emphasis instead placed on Ministry-esque rhythmic loops and that awkward half-comfortable “atmosphere” that now characterises “heavy electronics”. Chami has flirted with these “new-school” -isms previously, but has never lost the “Koufar character” in doing so. Lebanon for Lebanese, for all of its Profound Lore-isms, seemed constructed with a knowledge that the music was a vehicle for hatred//projection//expression. Phoenix Rising, Pheonix Falling, on the other hand, seems confused; forever stuck between conviction and marketing. It’s sanitised and seemingly detached; better resembling a kind of tribute to Koufar than a proper Koufar outing.
I’ll admit there are a few glimpses of that ever-so-charming vitriol of “the old Koufar”, but I keep losing them between the painfully boring synth loop that is “Cain and Abel” and the otherwise tasteless Puce Mary aping of “At the Right Hand…”. I don’t really want to force you to go searching for them, but if you’re
that desperate for your fix of “ethnic man with a point to prove”, I won’t stop you.
All-in-all, Phoenix Rising, Phoenix Falling is a kind of template for, "the sound of power electronics in 2017.” It may be, for all intents and purposes, a kind of Best & Less History of AIDS, but I guess that’s where the sound is going these days. To me, it seems the figurative death of degenerate power electronics, and the subsequent replacement of that sound with something altogether more yacht rock-y and fashionable, but whatever. I don’t really have grounds to complain anyways. I guess in that sense the title is quite apt, with one phoenix quickly turning to ash and the other rising out of some other ashen heap, but it’d be quite presumptuous to say that was deliberate.
I don’t know, I just don’t like this sound at all.
Fuck I feel old.
