Lords Of Acid « The RingMaster Review

Though new album Evolving is the first time we have come across US rockers Syztem 7, it is a proposition which immediately felt like an old friend back to eagerly stir things up. That is because the Seattle hailing outfit openly aligns familiar rock, industrial, and metal textures to their own just as bold imagination. It is the distinctiveness of the latter though which fuels and drives their rousing sound and makes their new album one highly enjoyable encounter.

The multi-flavouring adventure of their industrial rock sound has allowed Syztem 7 to share stages with and find support amongst the fans of bands as varied as Zakk Wylde, The Genitorturers, One-Eyed Doll, Thrill Kill Kult, Lords of Acid, King’s X, The Dreaming, and many others. It now provides a gripping incitement within Evolving which needed mere seconds to ignite attention and appetite as album opener No Regrets erupts to kick things off.

An initial lure of guitar makes for a potent coaxing, one swiftly ignited as the rolling rhythms of drummer Ed Rhoads add their ear grabbing bait to the great dirty grumble escaping Nathan Raynes’ bass. With keys keenly bursting into the already rousing mix, the track had us swiftly bouncing before relaxing into an infectious stroll alongside the enticing tones of vocalist Jason Ames. Rhythms continue to pick their spot with military precision, accelerating their strikes as the track’s anthemic chorus erupts upon the increasingly intense sonic hookery of guitarists Jaymz Kennedy and Shane Scot. Like a blend of Gravity Kills, Powerman 5000, and Rammstein, it is a gripping and highly manipulative start to the album and a persuasion only matched and twisted to greater temptation thereon in.

This Disguise is next up, the song laying down an electronic misting from which sonic tendrils wrap the imagination and a thick fusion of rock and metal spirals. As with the first, a certain familiarity in its voice and moves only entraps eager participation while fresh enterprise and individual imagination breeds the overall uniqueness which fuels the Syztem 7 sound. It swiftly had body and ears engaged passing them over to the just as easily persuasive Eternita Divina. Emerging as one of if not our favourite moment within Evolving, the song has a great touch of Breed 77 to its cosmopolitan web of melody and rhythmic animation, it all making the passage under our skin fluid and swift.

Proving just as captivating, Forgive and Forgets raises its anthemic hand upon the equally magnetic croon of Ames, the song with a Mudvayne meets Stabbing Westward air swiftly irresistible while The Worst sizzles on the senses straight after to match the virulence and captivation previously on offer. From guitars to rhythms, vocals to electronics, the track is a rapacious dance of varied rock enterprise designed to and succeeding in enticing full participation from its willing victims.

The following Skintag captures a 16 Volt/Celldweller hued temptation to its breath-taking enticement, the song another with a firm grip on best album moment as it nags eager and complete involvement in its arousing endeavours. Unsurprisingly it cast a web of tantalising flavours lined with varied and recognisable yet freshly individual threads in its energetic and inspiring weave and no shock, it too had us hook, line, and sinker.

Evolving closes out with firstly the physically intoxicating Godsend and finally the spiralling tempest of its title track. The first of the pair stalks the senses as it seduces ears with its melodic yet more carnal traits; its electronic elements inciting the bite of its rock and metal nurtured essences whilst equally breeding richer harmonic tempting in sound and vocals. Its successor aligns sonic turbulence and emotional intimacy with melodic intimation and ravening electronic contagion resulting in a final slice of inimitable Syztem 7 enterprise and audacity.

With every second, from its first lungful of sound to last, hitting the spot, Evolving easily rose as one of the year’s most arousing moments and Syztem 7 a band we can only anticipate much bigger attention rising up for.

Evolving is out now via Mighty Music @ https://targetshop.dk/product/syztem-7-evolving-cd?lang=en

https://www.facebook.com/Syztem7band/

Pete RingMaster 12/12/2019

We cannot say that techno and acid house are genres we have an instinctive appetite for here but we certainly have a hunger for electro adventure with plenty of confrontation; something you certainly and persistently get with Lords Of Acid. Their new album Pretty In Kink is a riot of electronic eclecticism, twelve tracks infesting body and imagination with creative deviancy and virulent contagion and a collection which salaciously arouse the senses.

Lords Of Acid is the brainchild of Belgian musician Praga Khan, an artist releasing his first single back in 1988. The project apparently evolved from his “extensive experimentation with drugs, Crowley-ian sex magic, and esoteric paths of self-deprivation and mutilation known only to himself”, the band the vehicle for him to “further encapsulate the seductive messages and raw sex of his ever-evolving musical vision.” The new album sees Khan link up again with long-time collaborator Erhan Kurkun and the entrance of new vocalist Marieke Bresseleers.

Praga Khan

Pretty In Kink opens with Break Me, the track emerging from celestial mists with a dulled but imposing throb around which electronics flirt. The immediately striking voice of Bresseleers soon rises from its midst, her vocals openly powerful but equally devilish in their character and delivery. The track continues to pulsate and almost menacingly entice, its electronic simmer simultaneous threat and captivation with infection spilling from every note and syllable.

The compelling start continues with Ma Fille De Joie, it too laden with appealing shadows and electro temptation this time from an industrial seeding. There is a touch of Kraftwerk to the song; its seductive prowl almost predacious at times but persistently darkly flirtatious before Sex Cam Girl opens its creative legs for ears to devour its dark electro juices. With swaying grooves and raw melodic swerves to its gait, the track entices as it fingers the senses and like its predecessors left intrigue and hips consumed with eagerness.

The following EBM spiced trip hop lined Flow Juice took things and attention up another level, the track electro addiction in the making. Bresseleers is the perfect tease amongst the similarly tempting antics of the synths and beats, all getting under the skin with viral ease. As potent a start to the release that the first trio of songs make, the album really came alive for us at this point, next up Like Pablo Escobar escalating the new gear in persuasion. Pure drama from its initial shimmer and bass bred hook, the track rises up into a rousing slice of electro rock again one as imposing as it is manipulatively catchy with guitars and synths colluding in their cinematic theatre.

Neither Before the Night is Over or Androgyny leapt on the passions as instantly as those around them yet with their respective melodic Heaven 17-esque smoulder with underlying volatility and sinister synth pop seduction, each blossomed in captivation by the play as too did Goldfinger, a track borrowing from the classic Bond theme but using the essence to wrap its own techno espionage.

They were soon firmly eclipsed though by the electro punk of What the Fuck! a track with a great Senser-esque feel to its vocal attitude and electronic belligerence. It is superb; a wonderful sonic irritant always commanding an eager scratch while So Goddamn Good straight after is a song which seduces as it croons. Pop and hip hop spawned vocals unite across the track, melodic caresses and sonic blistering teasing together alongside as again Lords Of Acid simply steal attention.

My Demons Are Inside from an underwhelming start for personal tastes was another which eventually wormed into the psyche, its KMFDM like instincts and breeding nagging its way into the passions though it is soon over shadowed by the album’s best track for us. Closing up the release, We Are The Freaks was quite simply irresistible from its first breath. Drama oozes every pore as industrial confrontation rises to its deviant feet to subsequently embrace a minatory Latino taunting. It is a glorious end to an album which not for the first time sees Lords Of Acid enjoyably tainting the music scene with their rivetingly unique electronic disease.

Pretty In Kink is out now via Metropolis Records; available @ https://lordsofacidofficial.bandcamp.com/album/pretty-in-kink

http://www.lordsofacid.com https://www.facebook.com/lordsofacid/ https://twitter.com/RealLordsOfAcid

Pete RingMaster 06/06/2018