Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Alter Egos

3-2-1 Activate!/Tub Ring - Alter Egos (2007) self-released

1. 3-2-1 Activate! - Eraser
2. 3-2-1 Activate! - Now It's Got a Hold of Me
3. Tub Ring - This Is The Sound
4. Tub Ring - Touch

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Here's a picture of 3-2-1 Activate!:
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now here's a picture of Tub Ring:
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Let me explain: Tub Ring fell apart in 2006. At the time the band was without a drummer, then their guitarist & bassist left, leaving the core duo Kevin Gibson & Rob Kleiner. They managed to replace the missing members, but used this high turnover to explore a different musical side.

3-2-1 Activate! (god what a horrendous name) is a band that explores the poppier, more conventional tastes of Kleiner & Gibson. The "same group of people being two different bands" is not anything new, but it's a concept that isn't very popular, mainly because it's confusing as all get out, regardless of how well you try to explain it.

Things do get pretty confusing however, because the band really didn't know what to do with their new persona. During all this regrouping & creating a new band, Tub Ring was writing and recording a new album, The Great Filter. Instead of using 3-2-1 as a vehicle for their poppier output, they just incorporated the more traditional song structures and catchy hooks into The Great Filter. The result are 3-2-1 songs that show up on the Tub Ring album. There's even an iTunes single by Tub Ring, that's actually a 3-2-1 song. Instead of clearly diving the two bands, they just mashed them together.

This split CDr, which was handed out at the CD release show for The Great Filter, only adds to the confusion. As a split, it clearly delineates between the two bands, but you'd never guess that from listening to it. "Eraser" conveys what 3-2-1 was going for. It's straightforward. Too much so, it's pretty bland, and verges on sounding contrived. "Now It's Got a Hold of Me" sounds like Tub Ring however, nothing very "pop song" about it. The Tub Ring songs are fantastic, they're infinitely more energetic and dynamic than anything on The Great Filter. The split is worth it for "Touch" alone (T.S. Elliot references never hurt either). As a whole, the split doesn't sound like two different bands. It sounds like Tub Ring for the most part.

I'm not forgetting any cover art, there isn't any. It simply comes in a paper sleeve. Fans were pretty upset with The Great Filter, since the 3-2-1 influence really detracted from what makes Tub Ring so great. This actually upset the band, and now they have something to prove, which they intend to do with their next album, which they just finished recording.

Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Heroin + Dub



De Facto - Légende du Scorpion à Quatre Queues (2001) on Modern City Records

1. Legend of the Four-Tailed Scorpion
2. Mattilious Creed
3. AMkHz
4. Hoxadrine (Live)
5. Muerte Inoxia
6. Vesica Pisces (Live)
7. Cordova
8. 120E7 (Original Version)
9. Exit Template

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Not that I've ever done smack, but this album tastes like heroin. It's trippy. Not in a psychedelic sense, but in a spacey, detached, opiate sense. De Facto ceased to exist when band leader Jeremy Michael Ward died of a heroin overdose in 2003. They started, however, as a side project of At The Drive-in, with most of their output taking place in 2001, as At The Drive-in was self-destructing (i.e., more hard drugs).

This album brings the dub, and heavy. This is one of a few of the albums that I own, out of hundreds, that requires turning the bass down. And of those few albums, this is the one I have to turn the bass down the most. I've never heard an Ampeg ever sound this thick & heavy. The entire album was recorded live to cassette, so the fidelity can only be best described as having "tape grain." While it may not be high in production values, it's perfectly fitting for this dub. The melodicas, (which duel at times) with their drugged, high pitched warbling, are captured beautifully, with no distortion or clipping. As I've mentioned the bass is a heavyweight, not to be messed with. If you can find Legend of the Four-Tailed Scorpion on vinyl, the bass is hefty enough to compromise foundations.

De Facto recorded everything live, so the two live tracks from a 2001 tour of Europe sound no different than any of the others. Actually that's a bit of a lie, they're the strongest tracks on the album. That's only due however, to the energy of their performance. Ikey Owens' keyboards on "Hoxadrine" is probably the highlight of the album, as is Jeremy Michael Ward's sound manipulation two thirds of the way through "Vesica Pisces."

If anything needs to be reissued as a boxset, it's the De Facto discography. Each release was issued by a different label, most of which have long since vanished. I'd say "all of which," except I'm unsure about the France-based Modern City Records. They still have a website up, but it hasn't been updated for over two years.

A live version of "Cordova" can be found on the sister album, Megaton Shotblast. Super high quality studio recordings of "Vesica Pisces" & "120E7" are on the single, 456132015.

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