Xasthur - Subliminal Genocide
March 21 2008 at 02:48:27 AM
Subliminal Genocide jars loose convenient repressions from aesthetics lectures: Is creativity truly part and parcel to art? Is repetitive creation aesthetic yield or commercial duplication? Chin scratchers the lot of them, and Xasthur’s latest—and last three for that matter—are salient point and fact for any pipe smoking, tweed wearing semiotician worth their salt. Many will preoccupy their selves with Malefic’s prickly estrangement from SunnO))), Inc.; others will wince and bristle at thee dark one hawking his wares within the Hydra Head shop window. And most will skim the subtextural revelation that Malefic’s been recycling songs and repackaging them as new material since 2003’s The Funeral of Being. It’s not that the songs are recycled entirely; it’s that the “sounds” of them are, as Malefic’s growth as an artist is irrevocably stalled in thumb-sucking stage. Exhibit A? The same tonal murk that was kicked up in Telepathic with the Deceased and To Violate the Oblivious is there again; the same “psychedelic” intros and outros slither through beginning and ending, pulsing electric eels cutting through ponds of oil and blood. The same vocals: a night hag covered in kerosene and burned down to a pile of black bones. The same bleating drum machine: a failing heart seizing and going cold. All of which is fine and good, but once one calls into question the creative impetus, the siren of intent is sounded like a big, greasy whale fart. Malefic can scowl, scream, and denounce the living all he wants while wrapped up in his black gown and slipped into his Vans, but it will never change the fact that Subliminal Genoicide is only boring exercise at best, thoughtless spinning wheels at worst.
[Stewart Voegtlin]
Xasthur
Subliminal Genocide
2006
Hydra Head
http://www.hydrahead.com
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