a a r o n

Around the time of new wave music, the "no wave" genre was created and epitomized by bands like James Chance & the Contortions, Glenn Branca, This Heat, and others that made music most decidedly against the conventions of new wave. Melody was often hard to find (if present at all), and the music had a grimy sound that made it forbidding to all but the most persistent avant-garde listeners. Even James Chance & the Contortions, whose rhythm section was incredibly danceable, remained far out in left field with their bizarre guitar riffs, squealing sax, and ugly vocals. Now, thirty years later, enter Mute Socialite, a band that seeks to take no wave to its (il)logical extreme. The drums pound away with fervor, giving the tracks a much-needed sense of structure, because on top of the drums is guitar noise. Occasionally this noise manifests itself into something vaguely resembling a riff, but much of the time it really is just noise (similar to the guitar work on early Sonic Youth records). This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it often feels overdone (or at least overused) on this album. Take, for example, "More Painful than Sex," which could be the best song on the album if it stuck to the powerful "riffs" and even the sections where you can almost distinguish a melody. The points where it feels like formless noise, however, don't do the song (or album) justice. There is one cover track on the CD, "Killing Time," which comes from noted no wave band Massacre's 1981 debut of the same name. It's a fitting track for Mute Socialite to cover, because if there's one band they sound like, Massacre is it. Unsurprisingly, the cover is a good indication of the album as a whole. "Killing Time," like many of the songs on the album, is quite a good song, but it gets too chaotic without any apparent reason. So it goes for the rest of album, which sees songs with plenty of great ideas turned into merely average songs because of the needless and arbitrary use of chaos just to make the album more, well, chaotic (or so it seems). On More Popular than Presidents and Generals, their debut CD, Mute Socialite sound very much like Massacre, only with less finesse, which they try to hide behind noise. That's not to say that this album is a bad CD, because it's not by any means. The three long (over five minutes) tracks on the album, "A Quiet Execution," "Cheap Clocks," and "The Damaged Country" all function very well and showcase the full potential of the band. If, on future releases, they can restrain themselves from getting too chaotic and step out of Massacre's shadow, they could have a bright future. More Popular than Presidents and Generals, however, is merely the awkward first step to getting there. review by Aaron N. — 8-22-08 —