Showing posts with label The Dillinger Escape Plan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Dillinger Escape Plan. Show all posts

Wednesday 21 December 2016

The Dillinger Escape Plan "Dissociation" (2016)


Announcing it would be their final record certainly enticed me to listen to Dillinger for the first time in many years. There reputation and legendary live shows are undeniable but the erratic math rockers never drew me in at a time where I was far more close minded. Its their seventh full length in eighteen years and a farewell as the group decide to call it a day and part ways. I wasn't quite sure what to expect but "Dissociation" drew me in instantly and the past few weeks I have been enjoying it ever so much. Its a fun wild ride with all sorts of crazy sporadic music and jazzy inflections between the dizzying onslaught of elasticated aggression.

At times you will be scratching your head, how do these guys perform this dizzying onslaught of erratic noise? Between more convention repetitions the music rolls into bursts of odd time signatures that have the guitars thrashing frantically as blast beats blast without form and it all sounds like a mess, a somehow how delicious, exciting mess. The record is diverse though, between its loaded moments they find measures of melodics, conventional song structures and vocal hooks to sing along to. "Fugue" marks itself as a fascinating interlude of disrupted melodies, schizophrenic baselines and glitched out drum programming quite reminiscent of "IGORRR". In the midst of "Low Feels Blvd" the music breaks from its frantic persona into a splendid affair of smooth Jazz in whats initially a cold break but the music finds its was back to its usual self as the elements get increasingly energized before a blast beat takes us back to the insanity normality.

Another quality of the record I enjoy is the layers of sound. At several moments in the the record there are submerged layers of synth and sound that creep out between the chaos of the leading instruments. It has its moments of simplicity but otherwise its a weaving organic web of sound elasticizing back and forth at the mercy of odd time signatures. There's little to fault, maybe singer Puciato's screams might turn you off but I just loved how much energy and emotion he put into his turbulent screaming, raw, harsh and animalistic although between those moments many more conventional styles arise.

"Dissociation" is a finely produced record with a ton of variety. No moment in the record feels like its retreading old foot steps and the constant evolution of the music keeps one on their toes. With little knowledge of their rest of their discography it seems like a solid record to sign off on however It leaves me wanting more of this sporadic art, luckily their is a back catalog to digest!

Rating: 7/10