Album
Type: Full-length
Date
Released: January 27, 2014
Label: Thrill
Jockey
You,
Whom I Have Always Hated – track listing
1.
The Wheel Weaves as the Wheel Wills*
2.
Manifest Alchemy*
3.
In Meetings Hearts Beat Closer*
4.
Coward (Vic Chesnutt cover)*
5.
Her Strongholds Unvanquishable
6.
The Devils of Trust Steal the Souls of the Free
7.
Terrible Lie (Nine Inch Nails cover)
8.
Beyond the Realms of Dream, That Fleeting Shade Under the Corpus of
Vanity
9.
He Returns to the Place of His Iniquity
10.
Lurking Fear
Note:
Tracks 1-4 were previously released as a vinyl only exclusive,
Released From Love.
Band
Members
The
Body is:
Lee
Buford – Drums
Chip
King – Guitar & Vocals
Thou
is:
Mitch
Wells – Bass
Andy
Gibbs – Guitar
Matthew
Thudium – Guitar
Bryan
Funck – Vocals
Josh
Nee – Drums
Review
Like
fellow Sludgelord contributor Andy Burke, I came to the collaborative
efforts of The Body and Thou without listening to the sprawling
output of either group. If nothing else, this release has showed me
that I need to remedy that as soon as possible. Distinctly not a
split, You, Whom I Have Always Hated is a new album featuring
input from all members of both American sludge behemoths, fresh on
the heels of the vinyl only Released From Love – collected
here as the first four tracks. Since Andy already provided a stellar
review for that album, and because tracks 5 through 10 distinctly
feel like a separate entity, I’ll only be reviewing the new tracks
here.
You,
Whom I Have Always Hated has all the hallmarks of classic sludge:
squealing, corrosive guitars; punishing, shredded vocals; aggressive,
sometimes tribal drumming. You can practically hear each time the
audio levels push into the red, each moment the group sounds like it
may tear itself apart. With both groups fully engaged in the
process, the resulting chaos feels all the more disturbing, while the
moments of cohesion are that much more breathtaking. Both the epic
sprawl of the 7-minute plus “Her Strongholds Unvanquishable” and
the concise thrash of two-minute “The Devils of Trust Steal the
Souls of the Free” highlight the sheer range of this true
supergroup, and the experimentation that sets them apart from their
sludge cohorts.
Strangely
enough, it’s a cover of Nine Inch Nails’ “Terrible Lie” that
proves a crucial centerpiece of the release. An industrial
undercurrent that runs through all six tracks suddenly becomes
codified with the track – all the sounds of rattling steel, buzzing
circuits, and mechanical chaos suddenly makes sense thematically. If
Reznor’s original “Terrible Lie” is steeped in the nihilistic
but sexy beats of cyberpunk dystopia, The Body and Thou’s sadistic
reconfiguration of the song flays all sensuality from the number,
retaining the nihilism but depicting a post-human, nuclear
apocalypse.
The
final two tracks, “He Returns to the Place of His Iniquity” and
“Lurking Fear”, really serve as an apotheosis of the
collaboration. “He Returns…” is a near-ambient exploration of
sound and tone, leading to the final assault of “Lurking Fear.”
An obvious nod to master of the anti-human, H.P. Lovecraft, the
violence and bleakness become their own sort of horrific sublime,
where terror stretches into infinity.
It’s
exceptionally rare that an album, or a work of art for that matter,
can effectively convey terror, but throughout this release I was
struggling to think of comparable works of art and kept returning to
masters of horror fiction: Poe, Lovecraft, Thomas Ligotti. Like each
of these authors, The Body and Thou manage to create concise, compact
stories of horror, which, when collected, should be seen as
guidebooks to human terror and masterworks of nuanced, unbridled
genius.
Words
by Mark Ambrose
Thanks to Thrill Jockey Records for the promo. You, Whom I Always Hated is released on CD/DD/Vinyl from Jan 26th 2015 from Thrill Jockey Records.
For More Information
The Body
THOU
