svart's Full Review: 34.7888% Complete by My Dying Bride
MDB had been one of my favorite bands ever since i bought their epic "Turn Loose The Swans" album. With each album after that, they shyed further away from the dirgelike Death/Doom Metal that they helped pioneer and progressed into more of a goth metal act. The vocals were cleaned up, the songs shortened and ABACAB structured, and lyrics became more direct and less poetic. This had happened in varying degrees to MDB's counterparts also. Anathema went to a more Floydlike approach, and Paradise Lost were marketing themselves as usurpers to the European Metallica Throne. Each of these bands had produced a very good album at this time too - namely "Draconian Times" and "Like Gods of the Sun," which were both good straightforward (well, compared to earlier works) metal.
Now this is where the story of My Dying Bride gets slightly kooky. 1998 brings us 34.788....% Complete. Exit Rick Miah and Martin Powell. Look at the title, sounds like a techno release doesn't it? Now look at the cover: gone is the whole trademarked My Dying Bride "beauty enveloped in darkness" look, replaced with a computerized spider and non-gothic font. One would say, "...book by its cover, blah blah," but in this case, you can.
The first song sounds like a rocked-out version of "the Cry Of Mankind." It is like MDB ripped off their OWN SONG two albums later and added Aaron's experimental version of Rob Halford's experimental Two album. And like "Cry of Mankind," "The {BLANK},the Cook, and the Mother" (edited for epinions.com standards...lovely) also has a completely boring ambient section too, but in this case it's in the middle of the song. No skipping to track 2 here, as the Bradford alumnus remembered in this studio that huge blank unplayed section of nearly everyone's copy of "the Angel and the Dark River."
The second track starts odd as well but then turns into regular MDB pinch harmonic bliss before turning odd again. A good track, but a definite reminder that the violin is GONE. Aaron Stainthorpe should also have been told that only Meg Ryan can fake orgasm on tape and not sound laughable. This section of the track should have been muted.
The rest of the music, with the exception of "Herion Chic, (which i shall expand upon later)" is actually quite good like the rest of the album. The guitars play a interesting role, yet the older MDB hooks still come out. Aaron's non-death vocals are the best on this album. With previous albums, the vocals never reached too much dramatically, but with "34.788%...Complete," Aaron sounds more emotional and polished, and quite comfortable with his voice too. Ade's bassplaying is also emphasized, for we actually hear him PLAY, instead of being buried under a matching guitar line. But all the hooks and gloss of this album fades when one remembers the true emotional potential of My Dying Bride. If this was side project this would be far better, but a good album nonetheless.
Expanding more on "Herion Chic," but you really only need to know 2 things; NA NA NANA & YEAH YEAH YEAH. This track is the worst on the album by far. It starts out as a flanged drum beat morphs into a VERY CHEESY machine loop. This sounds like some song you'd see in a movie where a cop is prowling around the red light district. Maybe they were trying to be a cross between Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Butthole Surfer ala "Electric Larryland." MDB had another "techno" track like this on the "I Am the Bloody Earth" EP, (YES! Death metal vocals and canned tracedub beats!!! Rock on with yo bad self!) and like that, "Heroin Chic" also does not work. Electronic music is only good as the though put into it, and there was not too much effort here. Maybe it was a statement, but another band should have made it.
Bottom line is this: This album's higher points outshine the lesser experimentations. Just buy the cd and fast forward through the junk and then it's a keeper.
Epinions.com periodically updates pricing and product information from third-party sources, so some information may be slightly out-of-date. You should confirm all information before relying on it.
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.