Comity
The Deus Ex-Machina As A Forgotten Genius
7.9
You can call this band anything you want and be right, I imagine. I hear Slayer-esque bits, Godfleshy bits, Cephalic Carnage bits, DC style post punk...emphasis on the Cephalic, I believe. I am a big fan of the Cephalic idea, although a part of that fandom is the fact that CC sound beefier than hell. Comity is not beefy, at least not by Cephalic standards. There is heft there, but it's through density of instruments rather than production, kinda' like Fugazi. The instruments themselves are somewhat poorly recorded, but that is the point if I am not mistaken. Under produced, over performed and despite my love for good production I also have a thing for recording with immediacy. This can be very emotionally satisfying music, and it can also be far too artish for its own good. Sometimes it screams "look how ccrraaazzyy we write, aren't we ccrraazzyy?" Is it Creative or just pretentious? God, when it works you are definitely taken on a trip, removed from where you are for a moment as the band plays some very Godflesh-like, melancholic passages. And just as often you are whisked into a frenzy of speed and death riffs, gutteral and screamed vocals and blistering rhythms. Fucking great shit! But when it doesn't work you are left cold, and end up having to work to get back into things. Track number two, for instance, made me want to stop listening and send the band a letter full of anthrax spores. It's recorded about 1/4 the volume of the rest of the disc, all twelve fucking minutes of it. What's that you say? "Turn it up, Ancient, you dumbass." Yeah, but that's not the point. Fuck it, they wanted it quiet, I leave it quiet. And I say to them "Fuck You, Comity, for song number two. Eat the shit right out of my ass 8 hours after I enjoy Chinese, you fuckers. Veeeeery artful. It adds nothing to the experience, it's retarded and fuck you another time. Blow it out your cutesy little cock garages." It completely rips me out of the record. I fucking hate that unless there is a damned good reason, and as far as I can tell there isn't. Musically this band falls into the "you have to be pretty good to even try this shit" category. Although not as precise or schizophrenic as Cephalic or The Red Chord or whoever, they play with intense emotion, and the whole product sounds spontaneous for it. No single player stands out above any other, and they all congeal impressively. Bottom Line: Any band that can make me this happy and this angry is worth a look, I believe. Five songs, around twelve minutes each, the band is not shortchanging you product wise. There is a certain brilliance here, despite how hard it tries. There is also a certain derivative aspect. None the less I will listen to it again. Except track number two, you fucking art-gimps!
