Thursday, December 31, 2020

I Divorced Life - Petting Zoo (2020)

The album art fits the music. We, the listeners, are the goat... waiting to be petted.
 
 
01. Pez Dispenser
02. Don't Cuss at Crows
03. Why I Drive Sober
04. Rug
05. Squassation
06. Ants and Honey
07. Abyss
08. Venus Fly Trap
09. Petting Zoo

This is a pretty weird album. It has some major Scott Walker vibes. It also makes me think of Gazelle Twin and Death Grips at times, too, while sometimes the music is very reminiscent of DLC, the Bolivian experimental rap artist. I'm sure there are more (especially smaller) artists that I've listened to with a comparable sound, but overall there is enough originality to set this album apart from anything it could be compared to.
 
The songs themselves just kinda blend together, even if they are clearly different from one another. There are no highlights, it's one solid barrage of pulsing beats with distorted noises and vocals like the psychotic moans of patients at a psychiatric ward. It feels genuinely uncomfortable to listen to sometimes, and that's really the only way it could be.
 
As "uncomfortable" as the music is, it's enjoyable. It's more like a horror film than any death metal album trying hard to emulate horror films because it feels like a descent into madness à la David Lynch, not a celebration of blood and guts.

The synths and vocals sound actually beautiful at times, too. The composition(?) is great; as much as all of these tracks feel like a unified whole on the album, they do work individually as well and taken out of context they're different enough, and they're actually good songs.
 
I said there are no highlights, but "Why I Drive Sober" may actually be one after all. It takes the cake in terms of sounding like a psychological horror film in the form of music.
 
Enjoyability: 8/10
Relistenability: 8/10
Memorability: 7/10
Coherence: 8/10
Flow: 10/10
Originality: 7/10
Epicness: 5/10
Nutshell: If Scott Walker came back from the dead to tell us about the afterlife, this could be what it would sound like.

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