If you’re feeling like it’s only Tuesday and you’re already deep in the morass between ennui brought on by over-stimulation and aimless angst brought on by an increasingly uncertain future then Brooklyn’s Meek Is Murder are your soothing balm. Was, the trio’s third album, is twelve tracks in not many more minutes of Kurt Ballou-helmed mercurial and angular, head-sploding catharsis. Seeing as how you can’t scream at the top of your lungs–at least not again, lest your supervisor has to have another talk with you–you better let Was do it for you.
Built on “retrospection and memory,” Was is an appropriate title for an album that hearkens back to a time when extreme tunes were messier, more concerned with expression than aesthetic, and overall less restricted by rigid genre expectations. Although Meek Is Murder aren’t some genre-blending variety show. Whatever influences get thrown into their grinder come out resembling nothing except their own laconic gestalt. While opener “Black Lung” is intermittently thrashy, mathy, and grindy, such tangents are divided by blunt force chugs to the cerebral cortex. Back-to-back emotional stompers like “Save Your Voice” and “Full Hearts, Empty Rooms,” bring to mind, in their unabashed sincerity, monumental records like Jane Doe and Background Music; but then the band throw themselves volubly, but no-less-disconcertingly into a spell like the sludged-out finale of “Victims and Builders.” “whatevercore,” indeed.
To elucidate the album’s ambiguous title, Meek Is Murder’s guitarist/vocalist, Mike Keller says:
“Typical humans. We think about the past a lot. We romanticize it to reconcile a disappointing present. We re-write history so it reads the way we wish it went. We black it out when it’s just too much. And worst of all, we forget. It’s a struggle to appreciate the good things or recognize the negative ones at the time they occur. As a band that operates in short, intense bursts, it’s important to take a step back and see our world for what it was.”
Drummer Frank Godla adds:
“We’re incredibly stoked to share our new album with the world today via Decibel. We put a lot of effort into making Was an album that represents us as a band, and reflects on our past while pointing towards the future. To have worked with so many incredible friends on this, like Kurt Ballou (producer), Alan Douches (mastering), Dan Miccio (album cover), and Dean Chooch Landry (promo photos) in and of itself is a truly awesome experience, and we can’t wait to party with you, too.”
Pre-order Was from Meek Is Murder’s Bandcamp, or pick it up IRL at their release show in Brooklyn this Saturday, July 16th.
