Album Notes

On his fourth studio album, Jason Crumer has further honed his craftsmanship and focused his vision. Recorded with meticulous precision, every sound is placed, mixed and arranged with purpose. Crumer coaxes an unprecedented depth of sound out of layers of electronics and field recordings. Romantic in nature and cinematic in scope, "Walk with me" exemplifies Crumer's remarkable approach. The album furthermore attests to his relentless honesty and total dedication to his art.

Review:
I first heard Walk With Me about 3 months ago and became instantly obsessed. I felt about this like I felt about last year's And Still, Wanting by Prurient. It was love at first punishment. But the weeks went by and I stopped listening to it as much and I still hadn't blogged about it. I think I went almost a month without listening to it again and when I finally stumbled across it on my iPod Monday night, I almost punched myself in the face for not reviewing it yet.

Walk With Me is the wolf in Little Red Riding Hood. You think it's sweet old grandma at first but it's not. Sorry little girl but it's a wolf. Which is great for me because it pleases both of my sensitive and masochistic sides.

The contrast on this album is what makes it. The light and the dark. The docile and the sadistic. Anyone can make a nonstop ear fuck but Crumer must have taken notes from Mogwai with their near-patented loud-quiet-loud method. It's like Walk With Me is saying, "Look at me I'm a pretty little Max Richter princess wait no I'm a motherfucking Merzbow demon whose sole purpose is to tear your lungs out through your chest and shit on your fucking heart."

And the final two songs on this masterpiece flow together in such a beautifully disastrous way, it brings a tear to my eye and a drop of blood from my ears. "Walk With Me" starts out with an unwavering Niblockian buzz that slowly accelerates down the runway until it gains enough speed to take off and becomes a fleet of twin engine Cessnas flying in perfect formation. After dazzling the audience with their majestic skillz, one of them fucks up and crashes into another, sending them all careening into a fiery spiral on "Pining" where they explode on the ground in a massive mountain of molten metal. Fucking epic.

Jason Crumer has scrambled right up to the top of the noise ladder in my heart, sitting right next to Prurient. I knew that I'd eventually find my noise record of the year but I had no idea it would come from a guy I'd never heard of. Now I sit patiently and wait for him to come to Boston...