Unsane

New York City: if the Velvet Underground paved the way for (dis)organized noise, the Ramones codified punk aesthetics once and for all, new wave branched it out extensively, no wave shredded it even further, and Sonic Youth forged the sound of generations to come, Unsane – a band perfectly embedded, at least ideally, within that metropolitan noise-rock context – gathered up all the experimentation carried out up to that point in the Big Apple and systematically transposed it into the (more or less) traditional "rock'n'roll" format. First and foremost, their playing style was much closer to that of New York hardcore (or rather, post-hardcore) bands than to the obliquely arty crowd or those given to brash noise digressions. Their music was nonetheless implosive in nature, since within the riffs, the instrumental explosions, the grinding guitar friction and the obsessive, cataclysmic percussiveness that was their trademark, a claustrophobic, self-corroding urge kept forcing its way through the songs – although perhaps "songs" isn't quite the word; "performances" pushed to the very limit of endurance would be more like it.

But, all things considered, their preferred field of action, their favoured stylistic coordinates, were all to be found in that Detroit sound which found its perfect embodiment in the late Sixties with the classic Stooges and Mc5. It was precisely from that way of playing rock that Unsane took their cue to better express their own visceral nature, their unsublimatable rage and anthropological unease, before transfiguring it through Pollock-like brushstrokes of black (r)age and amplifying it with the virulence of heavy metal.

So once again it's the city that never sleeps that gives us such a tumultuous creature: the original lineup, made up of Chris Spencer on guitar and vocals, Peter Shore on bass and Charlie Ondras on drums, was born out of a meeting at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville. And it was in the East Village that the trio made their name for the deflagrating atrocity and violence of their sound, often sharing the stage with equally extreme fellow local bands such as Pussy Galore, Cop Shoot Cop and Helmet.

It wouldn't take long for expectations to be confirmed, given the seismic jolt that inevitably arrived with the release of their self-titled debut album: "Unsane", indeed.

The tragic intensity reached by the twelve "mines" that make up the record is a thing of incomparable beauty: because it really is a matter of beauty, especially when it comes to how much astonishment can be found even in the ugly, or in what is unpleasant and disturbing in life as in art.

It kicks off right away in the "worst" possible way (no half measures), and in the blink of an eye "Organ Donor" makes its entrance – on the attack – with no preparatory intro whatsoever, not even an attempt to somehow ready the listener's mind. It's a real blow to the back of the head, its syncopated/rollercoaster rhythm hammering the ear relentlessly with a series of dry snare hits, the ultra-filtered vocals (a statement of intent that immediately sets the distance from any notion of accessibility, making the record's overall communicability rather difficult) and the guitars sketching out an overflowing crossover, certainly leaning more one way than the other. But with "Bath" we're already facing the first masterpiece: the vocal lines chase each other through strange, unexpected mutterings, the riffs trapped inside an obsessive circle, brutally blanketed by hallucinated walls of sound; and the drumming has often been compared to an actual tornado.

There's no escape with Unsane: all you can do is listen to this fury of thoroughly graceless structures and sounds and stay still, because the most movement this hurricane allows for is an infinity of repressed spasms: like heads about to explode... And the trail of (vaguely industrial) feedback that precedes "Maggot" leads straight into another hardcore-noise cauldron, whose only path can lead to yet more walls waiting to be torn down. "Cracked Up" stitches together another rhythmic tornado, with untamed guitars carving trails of foul air and essential solos – as throughout the band's whole output – stripped down to the bone, cutting through the disharmonic, percussive melee.

And (un)fortunately there's no time to catch a breath, as "Slag" comes in right away, a relentless, vicious slab of post-hardcore, right on the verge of a migraine-induced collapse.

"Exterminator" instead offers a bit more breathing room, finally allowing us to "contemplate" vocals "cleansed" of any distorting effect: the track advances stylishly over its full six minutes, then pauses halfway through before restarting with the same opening guitar arpeggio, building back up, and closing in a chaos of dissonant overlap. "Vandal X" first, then "Hll", are needed to restore the same fury as before, separated by the usual noise-industrial interlude and followed by the hard rock of "Aza-2000", with its Detroit-tinged and vaguely sludge reminiscences – its abrupt cut linking the track directly (fittingly) to "Cut", another claustrophobic piece duly marked by savage harmonics and a truly gloomy tonality, almost like dark wave pumped up on amphetamines. And after the acceleration of "Action Man", "White Hand" closes things out in the woozy, off-key drag of its heavy cadence, ultimately unfurling further, solemnly paced textures.

So to which temple did Unsane decide to sacrifice their cause? And we're not talking about the usual haunts frequented by the sheer number of sonically extreme bands, especially in relation to the grunge of those years, to stoner rock and to heavy metal in general: because if one thing is certain, it's the absolute sincerity with which Unsane chose to pursue a particular musical path, sacrificing a part of themselves and deliberately serving it back up on rusted trays; rust that would go on to directly corrode the private lives of the band's individual members too, especially that of drummer Charlie Ondras, who died in 1992 at just twenty-six of an overdose, a year after recording their debut/masterpiece. This album stands as a testament to his (percussive) genius and that of the whole band, a genius that certainly wouldn't end with this record, but which found here exactly the right ground to establish a paradigmatic sound.

Ethics and aesthetics in a fatal union.

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18/04/2010