Body / Head, The Switch (2018) ENG

Body / Head, The Switch (2018

By:  Erreh Svaia

Rock N Roll Animal

Immediately upon beginning to listen to the first seconds of The Switch, the new album by Body / Head, duo formed by the former Sonic Youth, Kim Gordon and Bill Nace one can detect the fact that texture becomes a priority over technique strict for these two iconoclastic artists, chilling sounds and far from the common logic, little by little they are transporting us to the entrails of a sonic universe equivalent to the visual style of a tormented and intoxicated Jackson Pollock, in front of us a somber ballet of sounds materializes that seem to be extracted from a mind like David Lynch or David Cronenberg perhaps, Gordon and Nace give free rein to their darkest instincts and at times it seems that their musical vision tangentially touched those glorious and grotesque universes created by the legendary Throbbing Gristle, and is that Las Time, at times reminds me powerfully to Genesis and company, although the band not only it releases those terrifying discharges of sound, it also gives time to create some extraordinary passages very much in the style of the huge Dylan Carlson and his extraordinary Earth band, the voice of Gordon barely appears in a subtle way, far removed from his role a little more predominant in his old band, Gordon here seems more obsessed with their guitars and pure sound, than with her past as an underground rock star, here Gordon is simply an artist behind a sonic brush and taken completely free by her intuition.

You Don't Need go back a bit to those menacing Earth-style passages and his obsession with American Gothic, which Gordon had already visited once with the Sonic Youth during his 1985 album Bad Moon Rising (An allusion to the Credence Clearwater Revival of the great John Fogerty?), For this topic, Gordon focuses a little more on his vocal performance, which at times reminds me of a Nico, that legendary singer who participated in the first album of the Velvet Undergound, "the statue that sang ", and that once he left the band of Lou Reed and John Cale, embarked on a very interesting career as a vocalist and composer, if she wanted to, Gordon could follow in Nico's footsteps adding also a touch of Patti Smith and her crude poetry to the one that Gordon here seems to pay tribute, while In The Dark Room lets out a series of notes as chilling as disturbing, pushing the texture to the front, to then generate powerful electrical storms barely directed by Nace and Gordon in an apocalyptic symphony.

Chance My Brain is possibly the closest thing we can hear in this album to a song, and that is maybe saying a lot, since the free structure prevails and the electrifying sounds released by the instruments of Nace and Gordon roar intensely wild, while the voice of Gordon manifests itself almost in the form of a trance, like a mantra, as part of a dark and old movie, with a terror she manifested that it is perceived even under the skin but that it never becomes evident at all, a sound triumph of which we are witnesses and that gives a forcefulness to this project, that previously we had not been able to perceive.

The Switch closes with the formidable Reverse Hand, where it is possible to find some form of guitars and an almost ghostly guitar riff that amalgamates in a surreal way with the ethereal vocal of Gordon, again the duo triumphs in their conception of creating something closer to pure sound rather than just ordinary music, The Switch is obviously not a rock record, maybe it is not music in the strictest sense of the word, what we are witnessing here is a creative process carried mainly because of the instinct that has been given free rein, of which both Nace and Gordon, rather than directors, are mere conductors of that dream or nightmare translated into sound, without a doubt a more elaborated and better conceived album than its two previous chapters , here Gordon and Nace, although not definitively, seem to have found their true voice and the true spirit of Body / Head, and the result is one that I quite like a lot.