Healthy Harmony
While Los Angeles art-spazz quartet [Health] has indulged some of the dance and Nintendo-core elements unfortunately proliferating like viruses in their respective post-indie rock and post-hardcore scenes, the bands self-titled debut comes a lot closer to conveying the bands powerhouse live presence and innovative writing style.
Its hardly novel to combine screams, stabbing keyboards, mushroom-cloud guitar and distorted bass, but Health ultimately sidesteps the genres it references and does so with a rather clever, finessed touch. Yes, the live show sounds (and feels) like a frenzied tornado, but Health seems to be going for something more grand, even as the band appears to experience a collective, fuck-all seizure onstage.
Recorded live at L.A. venue The Smell with vintage microphones, the album highlights but also restrains (tastefully) Healths best attributes, which will be displayed better when the band is roaring up close and in your face in its five area shows over the next two days, including a [CMJ appearance at the Knitting Factory ]tonight. Apocalyptic and majestic at the same time, almost symphonic in its approach to arranging noise, Healths sense of harmony and arrangement strangely comes across best at the full-volume, full-bore threshold where most other bands begin to lose their grip on subtlety and craft. But Health manages to marry the blasting noise of metal-tinged groups like the Locust, Fantomas and Melt Banana with the disco sensibilities of New Yorks Downtown indie scenebut outdo both camps in terms of the beauty they bring to the chaos. Youve seen noise acts before, but few can turn shrieking, banging, clanging and keyboard squalls into an inter-weaving vocabulary quite as fine as this.
tonight: 2pm R Bar, Brooklyn --- Vegan Party 8pm Knitting Factory --- CMJ w/ Ruins, AIDS Wolf, Aa, PRE (Health on @ 10:15) 1am The Cake Shop --- VICE Party
tomorrow: 5pm Soundfix 8pm Death By Audio, Bklyn w/ Ruins, AIDS Wolf, Sightings