x.a.o.s. - Psychomachy

Now, what I find myself listening to today is something that's quite different from a lot of other shit I've heard in quite a long time. It's a tone deafening experience, however, it's so good that you really just want to crank up the music even more until your ears are bleeding and your eyes are popping out of your skull. Because this is really what the album will make you do (headphone enthusiasts, you have been warned).

This is death industrial, that's for damn sure, but it kills me so well, I just wanna be revived all over again and just hear this album one more time, just to be killed again. The album opens up with these bits of static noise in "nil8", but transforms into a tune with heavy synths, and deep drops of everything under the sun throughout the whole song. And this is really how the whole album plays out. You try and find an escape from everything it provides, but the noise just washes you back under it's dark and soulless atmosphere until you come out with scratches, bruises, and cuts that you'll never forget again.

Each song chews you up, spits you on the floor, and rapes your ears. All of these terms are harsh, but so is the album; it really is unrelenting. Even when the songs get a little more upbeat, such as "Now is the Time", it still sounds so eerily joyous that I half expected that a fucking mutated creature would sing and dance along to this song as it tore me from limb to limb.

"Utopiate" is also different, providing for a much more ritualistic approach to the album, and is perhaps a saving grace from all the noise; I found myself breathing a sigh of relief when I heard this song just, for a brief moment, take me away from the electronics that were about to invade my ears again.

However, there was only one song that I honestly found thrashing me in the wrong way. And that would be "Hyperthesis". It's noise, alright, but it really isn't pleasant sounding at all, and there really is nothing to be said good about that song.

Continuing on straight into the end of the album, though, is like wandering out into the open world after being lost in a harsh forest filled with wild beasts of the most horrendous nature. It's like a song that says, "Thank you for listening to my album. Now, enjoy this peaceful song as it guides you back into a peaceful reality."

So, yes, I know this album was released in 2009, and it sucks that I didn't get to it anytime sooner than now, because Psychomachy will definitely stay in my library, and most likely on a list of songs that I frequently listen to, for a good while. May 15 2013