new record "Blazing fires and helicopters on the frontpage of the newspaper. There´s a war going on and I´m marching in heavy boots" that is about loosing control of yourself. We follow a swedish girl when she's looking back to the time when she got put in a mental institute.
I'd put the band members right here, but I cannot find a lick of information on these guys.
The above quote comes from their myspace, describing what the concept and main theme of this album is all about. Suffocate For *** Sake hail from Sweden, and create an interesting blend of Post-Rock, Post-Metal, Post-Hardcore and Screamo. There myspace describes them as "Sigur ros, Breach, Cult of luna, Mono, Mogwai (at the same time)." I believe there is some other influences prevalent in here though. You'll here a lot of rhythmic riffs played throughout a la Neurosis, but you'll hear a lot of asymmetric playing also a la the screamo genre.
Most of the songs have the same structure to them. Most start off with a slow build-up to an insane burst of energy for 1-2 minutes. Then a beautiful post-rock ambient landscape will be played in the background while a girl (speaking Swedish I presume) reflects on her past life and where she went wrong. Even with almost every song following the same structure, they all sound fresh and original on their own terms. Songs such as "Twentysix and Full of Plans" start off with a huge burst of emotion, before going into a post-rock ambient section. Only after she starts talking, it bursts into a post-metal build-up that would be seen on a Neurosis album. With a driving bass and drums (the bass is especially brought out throughout the album, but never does it overpower) a guitar picks up your heart-strings and imagination and brings you this young woman's story. The guitar brings you more emotion than almost any vocals ever could.
The production can open up the widest mountain ranges in your mind, and then transform your mind into a tiny claustrophobic space with emotions barreling down at you through a tiny path. Some songs, such as the first track, "Blue Lights and Sunshine" and the fifth track, "A Japanese Flag" rely a lot more on the vocals to cause the explosion rather than the instruments. With spoken phrases getting louder and louder until it explodes into a canyon of violent screams. Even in post-rock ambient sections, tortured, emotional screams will be heard, unsettling the stomach and mind as you imagine the horrible things that must've happened to her. With the lead singer screaming "Never Forget" in "Twentysix and making plans" over a ambient keyboard/guitar section, it truly hits down at the deepest nerves possible.
You can't skip tracks, or parts on this album. Together it flows as one giant collective story. A lot of the album revolves around these ambient sections that are in Swedish (the sections have a lot in common with The Early November's "The Path" disc on their last effort, as in a nice, warm, lush guitar part is played in the back, while she reminisces about her life. If you can get through these parts, this album feels a lot more worth it. Even though you pretty much can't understand a word they are saying (I for sure as hell can't), you feel a sense of connection with the girl, a sense of pity as she has lost control of her life and can't seem to get it back together. This is the hardest part altogether to get through for the whole album, but in the end, maybe after repeated listens, it feels all the more worth it, and like these parts actually belong and add to the album as a whole.
If you can get through that one problem, this album truly is a refreshing experience. It seems to dab into quite a few genres, while not getting their heads wrapped in one or just screwing it up altogether. Even if the album name is a little bit pretentious (or very pretentious), in the bands defense, Red Sparowes song titles are way longer, and that goes for every song title. I definitely recommend this to anyone who is a fan of post-rock or post-metal. While it does have screamo parts in it, they seem to come few and far between as the album rolls on, but those parts are also genuinely worth the wait.
4/5
