Infectious!
author: Barry Adkins Jr.
What started out with sickness has become infectious: that infection will only bring you down. Or will it? Rarely do we look at the dismemberment of a band as an opportunity for success, but sometimes the collapse of regularity is just what is needed for something unique and brilliant to happen.
This is precisely the case with RECS OF THE FLESH.
Pieced together by a cast of close friends, the band has become Massimo Usai on guitars and vocals, Sara Melis on distorted keys, Justin Wood (Chout of Small White) on bass, and Xavier Dilme (of Youtube ‘Xevifoo’ fame) on drums and percussion. This global assembly, orchestrated by Usai, has put together a series of sounds unlike anything audible from anyone else. And why is that?
ILLUSORY FIELDS OF UNCONSCIOUSNESS, the first full length album from RECS OF THE FLESH, is a stunning effort in terms of songwriting, musicianship, and production. Along with the fine drum work, the bass lines serve as an anchor for the music and are astonishingly addicting, which allows the guitar and keys to weave around and
create further dimensions of sonic experience.
Just listening to tunes such as “Intensive Care Unit” or the thought-provoking “Solutions To Non-Existing Problems” showcases this point, where the high-mid frequencies provide a trance-like environment while the lows keep thelistener from floating too far away.
This is not a tame release, but one with a message. Struggles tend to remove the hesitations that keep the mouth shut, and this is a testament to that. RECS OF THE FLESH hits hard and does not hold back, but after listening to this album the question flows in: “Why should they?"
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author: The Bunny @ BluesBunny.com
It would seem that most people want a safety net with their music. Maybe a cover version of an old hit. Nice looking boys and girls to sing songs that will fill their dull Saturday nights in front of the television. Then again, maybe you seek something a bit more excitingr…
And with a thunderous roar, you get it. Bloody hell! Recs of the Flesh don't hold back. From start to finish, this band sounds like the deranged offspring of some perverted threesome involving the Prodigy, Eternal Tears of Sorrow and the Doors. Heavily processed vocals predominate, guitars screech like the soundtrack to some strung out psychedelic trip. The keyboards reinforce the illusion whilst the drums thud away in the background nailing the songs down to the ground. By this time you get to "Intensive Care Unit" - a song that makes like that nightmare you get every now and then after too much drink - you've turned the volume right up. "Getting It On" is a tribal chant that stirs the spirit. "Not Easily Impressed" is nothing less than a steamroller. Interspersed between the tracks are sound bites from all over the place - there's even one from the X-Files!
It's not often these days that an album hits as hard as this one. There are death metal bands out there who can only dream of making as much sonic impact as Recs of the Flesh do. Perhaps not an album that will be to everyone's taste but very worthy of your attention.
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author: TheBane @ TheNotDead.com
The long distances separating Italy from the United States and Spain are no obstacle to unite a band like Recs Of The Flesh. A four pieced band which recently has been able to record a superb album which now I have in my hands. Baptized as Illusory Fields Of Unconsciousness (2008), I can't stop listening to it's tracks since the first time we've recieved it. An album with loads of variety, containing a splendid bunch of songs that only exquisite ears should appreciate.
Rock guitars are surfacing on the first song Social Failure which, acompanied with the beating of the drums, make the main rythm of a track that could perfectly be, though more sinister and dense, on the set of Queens Of The Stone Age at the time of Lullabies To Paralyze (2005). A sublime mix of Sara Melis dark keyboards with a Stoner Rock space sound perception is showed properly in Burnover, an impresive tune, a little bit lighter than the rest of the album. Distorted guitars appear again and heavier than before in the next track title, Intensive Care Unit.
Becoming something more exciting, and without losing one inch of it's darkness, approaches the next song, Getting It On, with a repetitive sound of rusted steel that can penetrate your brain. As a merge between The Pixies and Sonic Youth, we get immersed on Urban Tension Development Swing, an awesome track that demonstrates that Recs Of The Flesh domain some of the genres that surround the cosmos of Rock. The album goes on with Revelations From The Self, a song based on New Wave sounds filled with touches of darkness and sinister, recalling of a band like Placebo on their best moments.
The constant use of distortion on Massimo Usai voice, remains me of Rob Zombie debut album, Hellbilly Deluxe (1998) and also of Marilyn Manson on his first effort Portrait Of An American Family (1994), a comparation that finally fits totally when you hear the seventh track, entitled Friends?. But there's also time enough to take a look into Pop sounds, with songs like Not Easily Impressed, altough the use of keyboards became on a more psychedelic wave, a feeling you can get again with their following track Behave (On The Path Of The Psycho).
When we are close to get to the final part of the album, we can hear one of the best songs, in my opinion, included on Illusory Fields Of Unconsciousness (2008). I'm talking about Solutions To Non-Existing Problems, a good song charged with a compact atmosphere, well conducted in part by the bass depth on it's entry but also with the guitar slick. An awesome bridge breaks the song in two, making it more intense with some delay and chorus effects.
With a similar structure to other previous songs registered on the album, Never Forget brings the strenght and charm to the final minutes of this excellent debut. To surprise of the listeners there is another extra track at the end of the album, much more Punk Rock oriented. A nice end to a great work done by Recs Of The Flesh, an interesting band anyone should listen to.
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author: Francesco Nunziata @ OndaRock.it
Massimo Usai fonda i Recs Of The Flesh nel 2004, incominciando la solita gavetta tra demo e serate in giro per la natia Sardegna, portando in dote una deliziosa miscela di post-punk e noise che oggi trova un primo, interessante approdo in "Illusory Field Of Unconsciousness", disco, diciamolo subito, che mostra una band sicuramente talentuosa, anche se non ancora al massimo delle sue potenzialità espressive.
Sta di fatto, comunque, che i ragazzi suonano con evidente trasporto, ben amalgamati e finanche capaci di qualche bel colpo. Aromi di gioventù sonica e pulsioni wave, quindi, un ibrido ormai ben consolidato, eppure qui tutt'altro che scontato, grazie anche all'uso sapiente di atmosfere oblique e a quelle linee di tastiera (Sara Melis) che donano un tocco melodico al tutto davvero niente male ("Burnover", "Not Easily Impressed").
Se "Intensive Care Unit" evidenzia il bagaglio gotico con una marcia ipnotica solcata da feedback chitarristici e "Friends?" si perde in una giostra di dis-armonie, l'anthemico dark-punk di "Urban Tension Development Swing" va diritto al cuore e alle gambe, con la sua matrice Siouxsie Sioux (un nome che ritorna anche tra le pieghe della torbida ballata di "Revelations From The Self", persa tra i fumi di un inebriante quanto ambiguo romanticismo).
Più psichedeliche, invece, le atmosfere trasognate di "Solutions To Non-Existing Problems": la musica respira, gli spazi si diradano, preparando il terreno per il finale a tutta birra di "Never Forget".
Avanti così!
(26/10/2008)
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