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Questa è la storia di una band relegata nel suo paesino nel sud della Louisiana, lontano da New Orleans e lontana dal resto del mondo, è una storia di buoni musicisti, di ottima musica e di tanto male esistenziale. Nessuno sembra ricordarsi di questo complesso, creatura del singer Dax Riggs, a parer mio uno dei più eclettici e validi della scena Punk/Metal. Nato come band Death/Grind, riuscì in seguito ad una sgradevole ed impegnativa gavetta a guadagnarsi un posticino a livello locale: dopo aver evoluto il suo sound estendendolo in diverse direzioni, ottenne un sudato contratto con la californiana etichetta Rotten Sounds, che tuttavia non gli valse il successo che merita. Dopo alcuni lavori, il primo dei quali uscito nel 1991, il gruppo dà alle stampe “When The Kyte String pops”: è il 1994.
Parlare di influenze recensendo un complesso tanto personale è non solo un azzardo, ma anche un insulto a gente che aveva veramente molte idee e cose da dire: tuttavia non si può fare a meno di notare alcune analogie coi conterranei Eyehategod e in generale con tutto lo Sludge ed il Post Hardcore; nonostante ciò i nostri hanno evoluto uno stile molto originale, lontano anni luce da qualsiasi etichetta. Ogni pezzo è un miscuglio di vari generi tra i quali magari spicca di più uno rispetto ad altri (sia esso il Grind o l’Hardcore); insomma, sulla carta dovrebbero rimanere soddisfatti un po’ tutti, ma nella cruda realtà gli Acid Bath restano degli illustri sconosciuti.
La base Grind si nota soprattutto a livello tecnico: i membri sono infatti dotati di una preparazione molto buona, raramente riscontrabile nei gruppi Sludge. La difficoltà di alcuni passaggi li avvicina, anzi, addirittura ai virtuosismi di alcune band Death Metal anche se il tipo di musica suonata ne resta molto distante (eccezion fatta per alcuni passaggi in cui si fanno sentire le “origini”). La sezione ritmica, in particolare, adotta soluzioni veramente molto difficili: i tecnicismi passano spesso in silenzio, senza stupire esageratamente, ma un orecchio attento potrà coglierne a bizzeffe. I tempi sono veramente molto vari, così come è vario il genere proposto: nei pezzi più tranquilli, il drumming è dolce, quasi cullante, ma nel pezzo più duro può diventare la peggiore sfuriata di un gruppo Grind: si alternano insomma parti levigate e lisce a massacri sonori veri e propri. Non mancano momenti più vicini al Doom (molto lenti e cadenzati) di matrice Crowbar né pezzi molto melodici che ricordano i Neurosis. Già da qui dovreste capire cosa sono capaci di fare questi ragazzi, ovvero di usare i loro strumenti a loro piacimento senza fossilizzarsi solo in un genere.
Le partiture per chitarre seguono la linea descritta sopra: una varietà imbarazzante. Da arpeggi psichedelici, si passa a chitarre gemelle classicamente Death Metal per poi sfociare nelle aperture ruvide tipiche del Post Hardcore. Il basso tiene testa agli altri strumentisti anche se è forse lo strumento in cui più si sente l’influenza Metal. Riservio al cantante una nota di merito a parte dagli altri: quest’uomo riesce a destreggiarsi tra screaming, parti pulite e growling senza fare una piega e la sua voce si adatta meravigliosamente a cantare qualsiasi genere. E’ calda nei pezzi più ricchi di melodia, malata nelle canzoni più angoscianti, corrosiva quando è ora di abbandonarsi alla rabbia ed alla disperazione: una versatilità veramente infrequente. La produzione non è forse pronta a seguire tutti i cambiamenti di rotta delle varie composizioni, così quelle che ne escono privilegiate sono le più violente, mentre le altre potrebbero essere rese meglio.
Capite quindi che dare una definizione di questa musica non solo riesce molto difficile, ma che ,per rendere le idee chiare, rischio di “inscatolare” in una kantiana “forma pura a priori” questo gruppo, deformando ciò che intende essere e ciò che di fatto è. Tuttavia gli Acid Bath non sono solo dotati di un grande gusto musicale che li conduce alla ricerca ed alla sperimentazione (come i Naked City, per dire), ma riescono anche ad essere estremamente comunicativi: a tal proposito vi invito a dare una lettura ai loro deliranti testi, intimi e di una decadenza e di una disperazione tale da suscitare vere, agghiaccianti emozioni. Anche il mood, dunque, si dimostra eterogeneo e forse per questo più adatto a descrivere l’animo umano: tutti i sentimenti scorrono via con le canzoni, legati solo dal sottile filo del pessimismo più totale e nichilista. La confusione mentale si quieta nella contemplazione di un mondo in rovina, dal quale è bene mantenersi distante e nel quale sono racchiuse solo deludenti realtà. In verità, la delicatezza di alcune canzoni, l’immediatezza di altre quasi Southern Rock, e l’esasperazione di altre ancora, mi impediscono di considerare oggettiva la descrizione del mood di questo Lp. Ciò che è certo è che non è nelle intenzione dei nostri dipingere atmosfere rilassate: anche nelle song melodiche, una certa vena di malinconia e uno stato mentale costantemente vaneggiante rovinano quel che poteva essere salvabile.
“When The Kyte String Pops” è un disco che cambia ad ogni ascolto e che, come i liquidi, non si può stringere in mano: una proposta tanto stravagante e composita riesce paradossalmente a seguire una stessa strada non tanto per il modo di suonare, che è messo al servizio del loro estro, quanto per i sentimenti che riescono a generare. Il gruppo pare definitivamente sciolto in seguito alla morte del bassista in un incidente, ma quello che hanno fatto in passato merita attenzioni: non è una semplice enciclopedia di generi musicali, è molto più.
Elenco tracce testi samples e video
02 Tranquilized (04:13)
Sedated and lazy
Cold skies full of blue
The sun burns forever
It reminds me of you
On your dead shore
The sand is warm
She hides her tears and quickly lets it die
I will make it through even without you
My sky will be blue
I live tranquilized
Slow motion, liquid universe
I'm feeling nowhere
It doesn't matter where we go because I already been there
On your dead shore
The sand is warm
She hides her tears and quickly lets it die
Their dying of rabies, eating their babies
In a fields of dead daisies
I live tranquilized
I live (yeah..)
I live (yeah..)
I live (yeah..)
I live
I live
I live
I live
Tranquilized....
I'm numb (yeah..) and unfeeling
So I just burn and stare at the ceiling
I'm here but so far away
I see your mouth moving but can't hear what you say
And I don't think I'd give a fuck...anyway!
03 Cheap Vodka (02:14)
I blew my last five on a cheap fifth of vodka
Gonna kill somethin'
There ain't nothing gonna stop us tonight
I know about confusion
Lets start a riot
Lets start a war
Everybody that you know is a whore
fuck it, fuck it, fuck it, I don't care
If there's gonna be blood, we'll be there
I know about confusion
Turn on all the lights
So I can watch it die
I'm gonna taste some blood
Before they close my eyes
Because I got the answer
One bullet
I know ..how you feel
Cut out my eyes...So I can't see
The cold thing that's swallowing me
We're meat and that's it
So lets fuck it, fuck it, fuck it
04 Finger Paintings of the Insane (06:04)
Turning the knife buried in your stomach
I woke up live black with stain
Glistening and new the sunset's coming
Finger paintings of the insane
Come on and sterilize me
Kneel down and idolize me
Suck me, f**k me, resurrect me
Rut me, cut me and infect me
Slice me, dice me I wanna die screamin'
The thoughts of dead babies wiped away with my semen
Bleed me, feed me and inject me
Feel me, kill me then dissect me
The pigs will squeal their blood will drain
Finger paintings of the insane
Slice the throat of authority
Imagining infinity
Greasy smoke billows into the sky
Coach roach dreams, the human dust of pain
Twitching screaming hide your razor face
Finger paintings of the insane
Bloody mountain momma rockabilly machine
Kiddy porn lover with a mouth for disease
Giddy 'up honey my rubber f**k doll
When your candle's snuffed out I'll burn brighter than before
Pink poinsettias for emotion that died
A chilling wargasm that feels like cyanide
Her pussy bleeds sunshine, rabid for flesh
As each raindrop plunges to its death
05 Jezebel (04:53)
If I took this cigarette and put it out on you, would you love me?
Her throat is soft, her lips are red
Her thighs are white, her heart is dead
Jezebel (x2)
Red rope burns around her wrists
Her blood is cold, yeah, her heroin's kiss
Do you love your whore?
I like to hear you beg
She's crouched down in the corner with her hands between her legs
Jezebel (x2)
Broken glass and dirty needles
Soul erosion truth
Electric god, our superman
Found dead in a telephone booth
Shards of teeth
Ice pick abortions
Orgasmic death, so warm
Let's die screamin', black dog semen
I can hear you whisper "conform"
Hearts will stop and brain cells pop
Apocalyptic high
She screams bloody murder as they chop off her fingers
So this is how it feels to die
But it's okay
Yeah everything's okay
She was talkin' bout conspiracy
Talkin' bout takin' sides
I was masturbating just contemplating
The cold love of suicide
Hearts will stop and brain cells pop
Apocalyptic high
She screams bloody murder as they chop off her fingers
So this is how it feels to die
But it's okay
Yeah everything's okay
It's okay lover (x8)
It's okay (x2)
Jezebel
06 Scream of the Butterfly (06:14)
A creature made of sunshine
her eyes were like the sky
Rabbit howls like something old
As we twitch to a lullaby
The scalpel shines in god's sunshine
The Streetlights whisper pain
Down here near the poison stream
our god has gone insane
She smiles like a child with flowers in her hair
with blood on her hands
into the sun she stares
She feels it die
I heard her cry
Like the scream of the butterfly
She smiles like a child with flowers in her hair
with blood on her hands
into the sun she stares
She feels it die
I heard her cry...
like the scream of the butterfly
Sunshine in the house of flames
she loves it where she gets it
but it's never felt the same
surgery, in the house of dissection
when your candle burns out..I'll resurrect you
she runs
through fields of daisies
yeah, it's just a shame that they eat their own babies
Who cares
cos the air is free
when you get there will you kiss the dead for me?
there's blood on the moon and the summer is cold
there's love in the room
but baby that's getting old
there's blood on my face sittin' on uhh dead shore
A highway,highway of emptiness and I'm getting bored
There's blood on the moon as we plan our escape
The goddess in bloom
handcuffed and raped
There's blood in the bathtub baby
murder the king
there's blood on the moon
there's blood on just about everything
Sunshine in the house of flames
she loves it where she gets it
but it's never felt the same
surgery, in the house of dissection
when your candle burns out..I'll resurrect you
she runs
through fields of daisies
yeah, it's just a shame that they eat their own babies
Who cares
cos the air is free
when you get there will you kiss the dead for me?
Something cold is forced inside her
a tears spill down her cheek
stillborn songs of a dead dreamer
hymn's of a needle freak
With sunlight in her hair she smiles like she don't care
her dreams of liquid blue
I cut my self again and again to remind myslef of you
She smiles like a child with flowers in her hair
with blood on her hands
into the sun she stares
She feels it die
I heard her cry...
She smiles like a child with flowers in her hair
with blood on her hands
into the sun she stares
She feels it die
I heard her cry...
like the scream of the butterfly
I like the scream of the butterfly
I met an angel with a sawed-off shotgun
wanted by the FBI
we dropped some acid
killed our parents
then we hit the road
I like the scream of the butterfly
08 Dope Fiend (05:19)
Why do you love to lick my wounds?
Why do you love to feel my pain?
Why do you love to suck my life?
Why do you look so motherfucking dead? ..Dead? Dead?
Why do I feel so dead?
Why do I feel so high? High? High?
Kill me...I'm a dope fiend.
Do not touch me for I am unclean
Kill (your television/kill your time) Kill me
Kill (the cold embryo/kill my mind) Kill me
Screaming insects hail the Queen
Welcome the killer home
Hold me close to your dead heart
and let the rapist roam
Put your bloody hands on me
And whisper in my ear
Burning bodies keep us warm
And have for many years
Why do you love to lick my wounds?
Why do you love to feel my pain?
Why do you love to suck my life?
Why do you love to lick my wounds?
Why!?
Yeah motherfucker, I'm high. And I'm thankful just to be alive..
Yeah motherfucker, I'm high. And I'm thankful just to be alive..
Yeah motherfucker, I'm high. And I'm thankful just to be alive..
Yeah motherfucker, I'm high. And I'm thankful just to be alive..
09 Toubabo Koomi (05:01)
we wanna see some blood
we need a new whore
we don't give a fuck
we just want more
blood
we want
blood
we want blood
I'm gonna fuck the hole in Kennedy's head
revolt deface resist
push the button
Legalize Freedom
let's shoot the president,
rape the queen
and feel the flowers breath again
inside this dead machine
swimming into nowhere
thrill kill avenue,
cuttin' her slowly
liberty, she crawls to me
I slept the last mile on our way to endsville
shove it inside her
spectro-trippin on
I slept the last mile on our way to endsville
spread your legs,
don't look at me
cut me, rape me, make me free
breeders screaming dreaming bloodless
for the loveless
white sound, oceans of dreams
I won't be another number on the screen
shhhhh: I wanna hear you scream
I won't be another number
white sound, jet black scream
vomiting this cold mass of hate
I'm gonna push my love
through her skull
through her skull
through her skull
through her skull
through her
I have heard abortion
stories from the leather nun
holding hands with dead girls
hiding from the sun
I did a line
I did a line
I did a line
I did a line
the lines that define begin to gray and fade now
we shoot out the lights and swallow razor blades
I feel nothing for the meat that came before
liberty, she crawled to me playing the whore
10 God Machine (05:00)
The God machine is hungry for individualism and ripe brains.
The skull farmers do their rain dance and pray the machine falls to sleep.
She holds me close and whispers wet, there are cannibals among us.
Mad in love with dry dead boys in the backs of abandoned cars.
Smoking the bones of children, plotting the murder of love.
Strapped into the chair the needle now descends
As they lick their cracking lips their twitching never ends
Blood beneath their finger nails, swallow all my pain
Dirty needles break the skin, suck hard as I drain
Drain me (x2)
Sunken eyes, a twisted spine, a whiter shade of pale
Rockabilly man come to pound the coffin nails
Inject my stomach full of cockroach eggs
Their machine is coming carried on a million legs
Waking in the sleep of reason, winter is the forever season
Lick thy mother's bleeding lips, from this glass of hate we sip
Fuck the glass we pump the keg, kill conception at the egg
Her chin is wet with someone's hate, love, disfigure, amputate
Amputate (x2)
Can you remember how it felt to be alive?
Your god machine is cold and dead your eyes they cannot cry
Fuck your deities of dying love!
We have shot them down from the skies above
Screaming convulsing, my eyes are bleeding
Be silent now and take your beating
I wonder how long you would live with a bullet in your gut
I wonder how much shit you'd talk if your throat was cut
I wonder what you'd sound like begging me to let you breathe
I wonder how much pain it would take to make you all believe
Believe, believe, believe, believe in me, yeah
I'm your god machine
Fuck your god!
11 The Morticians Flame (04:05)
Hunter of tears, relative to pain
half of this world is dark with the stain
the stain of unknowing the dead flowe buds,
on smiling lips is innocent blood
the corpse of your god can only rot
and grow cold now promise
you'll kill me before I get old
I heard you on the telephone moaning
my doom a cold woman will kill me in a darkened room
the chain-saw smile of the mortician shines
I still got all my fingers
but somewhere I lost my mind
I can smell abortion on you I can see thru
I take the gun out of my mouth and point it at you
12 What Color Is Death (03:19)
The shade of an ice pick sinking into flesh
Sex-n-sex-n-sex-n-death
I don't want you I want your flesh
Close my eyes and dream of death
Slip away and take a breath
Rivers running dark and cool
How can nothingness be cruel?
Trip with me and meet the sun
This orgasm of light
Suck the world inside yourself
Spitting forth the night
I listen to the trees they hum
And hold hands with the moon
Insects whisper sweet nothings
The solar system blooms
The skulls of babies grow within
The garden of the soul
Where the girls run barefoot
And all life lives uncontrolled
Come on baby let's kick back and bleed with me awhile
Nevermind the cold black truth that stains the kitchen tile
13 The Bones of Baby Dolls (06:00)
Flower girls play lover
Grave games in the courtyard
I heard her screaming like a radio
Flower girls play lover
Grave games in the courtyard
I heard her screaming like a radio
Mary lou left marks on you
She just screams at the walls
The kite string pops
I'm swallowed whole by the sky
We smoke the bones of baby dolls
Techno-liquid screaming meat
Heaven's cold beneath my feet
Cyber love the anti-man we make love... because we can
Virgins play where the bayou's blue
Barefoot (and bloody) eatin' mushroom stew
Work for pay and pay for freedom
Fuck 'em all, we don't need 'em
We smoke the bones of baby dolls
Everything's gone dry
Like bottle glass scraping cross the pavement
Everything's gone dry
Like bottle glass scraping cross the pavement
Everything's gone dry
Like bottle glass scraping cross the pavement
Everything's gone dry
Like bottle glass scraping cross the pavement
14 Cassie Eats Cockroaches (04:24)
"She came towards me, and with the light like it was, the like light of heavenly grace, and the first thing that flashed into me gulliver was that I'd like to have her right down there on the floor with the old in-out - real savage."
I feel the wetness of her tongue that slides across my skin
The viruses crawl over me and feel for some way in
Cassie loves to swallow, this bleeding will not stop
I left cassie hollow, cut you with my cock
Cassie likes it in her hand, Cassie's dead inside
I came to f**k the open wound, so hold it open wide
Cassie loves to swallow, this bleeding will not stop
I left cassie hollow, cut you with my cock
Show it to me, spread your legs
Don't you f**king look at me
Show it to me, spread your legs
You are so f**king suave
Let's f**k!
Take me into the ocean, lay me out on her shore
Wake me when the sun burns out and we'll run forever more
We're all gonna die tomorrow, the freaks are screaming burn it down
She can't feel the weather, I can't touch the ground
Pale and twitching, twisting to the cold dance
Watching the room grow old, a funeral romance
Somewhere, someone's screaming that the world's gone
Smear me with your blood and let these dead boys sing their grave songs
Suck
Slide across the warm red floor to meet me
Lock the bathroom door before they crawl to eat me
Cut her throat and whisper that we're going home
Twitching to the cold dance, they suck the meat from her bones
Suck, suck, suck
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