| The
Review |
The Mars Volta return with their 3rd studio release -
less than 2 years since the last one, Frances the Mute. In
my review of that album, I noted how the band had promise
when they were actually playing, but had developed an irritating
quality of inserting random noises for 4-5 minute spans in
their songs, making listening to that album very difficult.
For those concerned - that problem does not exist nearly as
much with this release. Amputechture is a good album, but
unfortunately, it has other faults.
Mars Volta are definitely an unusual band. They take complicated
and often angular guitar riffs, very interesting and busy
drum beats, and overlay them with high-pitched vocals that
are quite good (I'm a sucker for the high-pitched singer).
Their first album was fantastic, and re-defined what bands
could accomplish in this new prog-influenced era. Amputechture
takes a bit of "De-Loused" and a bit of"Frances the Mute"
and throws them together along with some serious ambience.
The first track, for instance, is little more than 7 plus
minutes of a slow guitar riff (no drums or bass) and vocals.
Not bad, but certainly not the busy band we all have become
used to. The last track (El Ciervo Vulnerado) duplicates this
formula, but is horrible in my opinion as it has no melody
to speak of and is ambient noodling. (Note - musical instruments
are actually being played for this noodling, unlike the random
noise noodling consisting of whirring, bleeping, static stuff
on Frances). So - that is roughly 16 minutes of the album
that isn't that great. Add another 6 minute track (Asilos
Magdalena) that is simply acoustic guitar and spanish singing
(actually gets quite boring and repetitive) and we now have
22 minutes of not so good stuff.
The remaining 54 minutes are actually quite good. This
is the more traditional Mars Volta that we all know and love.
They have added some synths here and there and a good amount
of organ. To me - the highlight is the 16 minute Tetragrammaton,
which has little filler and rocks throughout. The vocals are
of course the best part about the album and you can tell a
lot of effort was put into the melodies. Overall a good album,
but skip the last track for sure and you will find yourself
not listening to tracks 1 and 5 often as they are simply "OK".
Rating: 3.5 stars
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