Like a lot of people I was not taking much notice of the Oils by this time. I've heard this song a couple of times, was not overly impressed by it. There isn't much of a tune there, and the "chorus", if that's what it is, is pretty generic grunge.The feeling I get from this song is that the band keep playing because "that's what we do", but it's sort of MO-by-numbers.
Concrete Again this song has a fairly modern sound for the time. On first listen it sounds like the band were reaching back to their more hard hitting style from earlier albums while staying firmly in the sound of current trends. this is another good song, that seems for the most part to be the more traditional hard rock sound that the Oils had always been known for.
I didn't get to comment on all the tracks on Breathe, but in summary I think Underwater is the only song that's at all interesting. Gravelrash sounds like they had an idea for a song in there but simply found they couldn't come up with a lyric so left it as an instrumental. It sounds incomplete as is, not strong enough to stand on its own, unlike their other well known instrumental, Wedding Cake Island.
Hmmm, I don't like that one much. If the first two songs on this album are anything to go by, it's as though they got rid of all their angry hard-hitting aspect on the previous album and saved it up for this album. Breathe sounds like an album of safe, non-threatening, almost MOR songs; this one all harshness and venom. From one extreme to the other, and I think neither one works.
If there's a song in there it's hard to tell, buried under all that production trickery. I bet it was better live, as long as they didn't try some misdirected attempt to reproduce the recorded production.
yea that's what i mean about the sound of current trends. everyone was doing the semi-techno thing at the time. but the core of this is still a hard wrong song .... smothered in techno sauce lol
On that song it sounds as though the Oils were trying to do a pastiche of Tool, The Prodigy, and Nine Inch Nails.
Cemetery In My Mind Another pretty good song. With the ubiquitous drum beat of the late eighties, early nineties.
Comfortable Place On The Couch This song leaves me feeling that the Oils had the right idea with this album, but either they or the producer got caught up thinking the band needed to join everyone else in putting synths and sequencer sections in all the songs. Perhaps that is where they wanted to go, I'm not sure. The guitars that open this song are brutal and any number of hard core metal bands would hve been happy with that sound i reckon. Then it break down to some synth and drum machine sections, and yes we end up with a sound somewhat like Ministry or NIN and the fact that this is the Oils is only given away by Garrett's voice.
Safety Chain Blues I get the distinct impression listening to this album that the band were trying to step back in time and do the same kind of experimenting that had made 10-1 such an amazing album. For the most part, it doesn't seem to work on this album .. I'm not sure why, perhaps just trying too hard ... For example, this song is good an interesting, but it is just a bit too all over the place. We have a grand piano sound and some stings with some grunged out to the max guitars, a vocal that is a little too effected, and the overall sound isn't so much the sound of advancement, but a melange of sound that doesn't sit comfortably together.
Return to Sender We have some digital noises, joined by an electric piano, drum machine sounding drums, a close mic'd, super compressed Garrett vocal. This isn't awful, it just sounds not quite right.
The more songs I hear from this album, the more depressing I find it. Most of these songs fail for me, on nearly every level. Mind you, after the excellent run of albums from 10-1 to Blue Sky Mining - and some would claim additional ones before and after - it's hard to see where they could have gone without either sounding stale or losing their fans altogether - a dilemma that's been faced by many successful bands. This album made top 10, but I think that was largely because of who it was, rather than the album itself.
Blot Again we're hit with a wall of techno sounds, some hard edged super saturated guitars and highly effected vocals. I don't think this is awful or anything, but it seems reactionary to having slipped into a mainstream US rock styling, and the band just took a huge left turn and we end up with a virtual industrial metal album.
The Great Gibber Plain This song starts out with some acoustic guitar and a straight vocal with what sounds like a glockenspiel playing a counter melody at the end of the verse. Halfway through the song the band or producer feel they need to techno the song up and a much needed breathing space is filled.
Well at least this song is not an all-out assault on the senses. like some of the other tracks. This is actually listenable. Those techno touches are unnecessary, but I wouldn't say they ruin it. This song could be a grower, though it wouldn't be enough to make me buy the album.
Been meaning to write something about this album for the past few nights, but haven't had the time. Tonight I decided that it would be a good idea to listen to the whole album as loud as my stereo could handle before I wrote anything, and I'm glad I did. Most albums sound best loud, but this album in particular rewards listeners who turn it up to 11. There's a lot of fuzzy, distorted, mid-range sounds bouncing around on this record, and without some low end frequencies smacking you in the chest to balance it out it's not nearly as effective. Maybe they were trying a little too hard to be of the times with the production, but the songs are mostly strong. More importantly though, the playing sounds inspired. The band sounds more engaged than they have since 10 to 1 or Diesel, fueled by righteous anger. It's a noisy record to be sure, but there's plenty of melody to be had as well. Originally, I was going to say that it was their best album since D&D (which might have been damning with faint praise), but after a re-listen I think it's a really good to great record on it's own terms. Not as good as 10 to 1, but up there with their best. The title song made a ferocious opener when I saw them in Denver last year! Some vids: Redneck Wonderland/Concrete
like i said initially, this is the first time I have heard this album. I knew redneck wonderland the song from the radio, and I liked it. This is an intriguing album, stylistically it fits in with music i like, it just seems so strange to hear it coming from Midnight Oil.
Seeing Is Believing This track starts of with a nice little riff, that brings to mind a hybrid of Cowboy rock and the James Bond theme. This song gets some room to breathe and is less infiltrated with the then modern sounds and effects. A good song, that works well in the context of this album.
