Album Notes

The idea of Szleppard as a band has been around since about 2001, after several years of gigging, writing, and generally enjoying London's vibrant music scene. After a move back to the quiet countryside city of Hereford I began work on what was to become 'The Resonant Frequency Of Flesh'. A former collaborator had the following to say about a pre-release copy: 'The Resonant Frequency Of Flesh' is the outcome of a mixed bag of influences, blended together to leave the listener with something that overall feels heavy and extreme in its intent, yet with moments of electronic subtlety that appear throughout to soften the intensity of the heavy metal tones. This is often a complex and ambitious album, particularly as shown in the instrumental 'Dave', where tricky timing signatures and big song structures are used to weld heavy riffing to atmospheric synth washes, backed with multi-layered vocals and clean guitar tones. Track 3, 'Deal With It' shows more of an old-school metal influence (generally prevalent throughout the album), building melody from fierce guitar riffs and multi-layered background vocal parts, ending abrubtly and dropping the listener into the more electro-style ambience of 'Rainbows Over Rotherham', somewhat reminiscent of a Trent Reznor remix. 'Warning, Beavers!' is a fierce, down-tuned and nasty piece of work, warning, as suggested, of the problems with beavers. No further comment is required! A more Squarepusher-styled piece of glitchy sonic abuse follows, before the album takes another turn down a more electro-metal path; essentially a rhythm guitar solo designed to hurt your brain. More complex rhythms follow in a more traditionally-structured song, 'Everything', somehow leading to comparisons with Meshuggah, early Genesis and Killing Joke, all in the space of 2 minutes and 42 seconds. 'Devour Me' is probably the most accomplished piece in terms of its direction and intent, with a more melodic, anthemic feel than other tracks, yet still it's no easy listening experience due to its pace and tight rhythmical layout. However, the song again ends rather too abrubtly. The album finishes with the same processed, disembodied narration with which it begins. Certainly the whole work contains a range of sounds and ideas that show a distinct development in song writing ability and technical proficiency. There is an intent about it that is both serious and healthily tongue-in-cheek at the same time. With an increased confidence in the Szleppard vocal ability, many great things lie ahead as those ideas continue to become fused into more ambitious and consistent works.