KK Rampage
Lies, Deception & Tall- Tales
Rampage Recordings
By Jose Fritz
KK Rampage eschews the normal concept of “album.” What is an album? After the invention of polyvinyl chloride by Henri Regnault, record grooves could be closer together thus allowing much longer playing time per side. Previous to that the LP was prevented by the brittleness of shellac. The record’s groove walls would actually collapse if too thin. Hence Album-Oriented Radio was born (AOR) and immediately afterward the somewhat painful idea of the “concept album.” It’s all very interesting of course, but at its root, an album is just a collection of songs.
KK Rampage isn’t into that. Each disc they release contains typically three to five “songs,” covers hand decorated with colored pencils, crayons, bad line drawings, markers and stamps of sheep. In short, the inserts look like a scratch pad left out in the lobby of the lunatic asylum.
They describe themselves very well, as few bands do: “Louder than sound and brighter than the Sun” or “Like feeding raw meat to a vegan” and more succinctly, but more accurately as “brutal shit.” They are the noisiest band I have ever heard that still bothers to use these things we call “instruments.”
This is an album for the next echelon of music for fans of Bulb Records or Skin Graft. Nothing on the record is dissonant, there are no wrong notes. The noise comes directly from feedback, static and distortion, which are technically atonal The sounds do not possess notes thus harmony is impossible as are harmonics, at least not tonal ones.
In the two days that I spent examining their catalog and researching the band, they managed to release two more “albums.” They followed up this EP with a limited edition split cassette with Shearing Pinx containing the song “Conform Yourself,” which is the most structured song they’ve ever done; though that’s not saying much. While I was editing my grammar they put out a 3-way split 7-inch with Hot Girls and Pretty Thigh. I was hoping “Conform Yourself” was indicative of some internal movement within the band toward these structures conglomerations of sound we call “songs.” But apparently it was not.
Everything about them is frantic: the tempo, the writing and the recording. They are clearly in dire need of maintenance medication for that ADHD. Recommend you take with food or milk, this can cause an upset stomach.
|
