"
Altered States of America" - the paradigm of extreme narco-grind, spanning over almost a hundred songs dissecting the thick layers of filth on humanity's underbelly. The brainchild of Scott Hull (famous from bands like Pig Destroyer and Anal Cunt) takes the listener on a 20 minute journey of shock, awe, disgust and sonic abuse - programmed drums blasting away at up to 1,000 BPMs, accompanied by vicious metal riffs, vocals grunted, spoken, screamed and growled as well as miscellaneous odd and ominous samples and soundbytes. With the average song lenght being just over 12 seconds, recommending high-lights seems redundant - your best option would be to get the album, put your headphones on and just sit back with the lyrics sheet and let the ugly chaos implode your senses.
It's imperative to realize that Agoraphobic Nosebleed in general and this album in particular isn't necessarily music as much as it is a kind of artistical installment of noise. Everything - from samples and vocals to drum beats and riffs - is pushed beyond limitation and exhaustion to acheive excess for the sake of excess, making it hard to differentiate between brilliance and pretentious hyperbolism. But for creating an effect, if only one of shock, their eclectic arrangements work wonders.
And that's not even touching upon the lyrics of the album. As previously stated, they're for the most part an excursion into everything filthy in the world (like paedophilia, cannibalism, trafficking, sodomy, rape, murder, pop culture) and range from resembling social commentary and critique, to being blatant displays of disregard for humanity. Or how about the lyrics to "
Narcoterrorist Megalomaniac";
There's so much money in guns and drugs
I could have anyone killed with a phone call.
South American women being torn apart by huge cats for my masturbatory amusement.
Nothing like paying for a four thousand dollar boob job on a third world slut and have it ravaged by albino tigers.
While having another slut on your dick trying to disprove her expandability.
...or the 12-song suite of the days of Sodom, in which in part three, Eve (known from The Bible: Genesis) grows a huge d
ick and f
ucks a snake. Yeah.
The albums works best, no - the album works
only as a complete piece. Since it's 99 songs spanning "just" 20 minutes, it's not much to ask that one listen to it from beginning to end. Actually taking the time to do that, just listening to the album (preferrably with access to the lyrics) is guaranteed to make you feel like you're on just as much drugs as the band must've been on when this album was conceived. And if that's not an accomplishment worthy of genius-status, I don't know what is.
