Released
1990
Label
Nettwerk
Reviewed by
Michael C. Lund
Visit
Last Edit/Update
23 March, 1998
Skinny Puppy
TOO DARK PARK
Track Listing
1. Convulsion
2. Tormentor
3. Spasmolytic
4. Rash Reflection
5. Nature's Revenge
6. Shore Lined Poison
7. Grave Wisdom
8. T.F.W.O.
9. Morpheus Laughing
10. Reclamation
Too Dark Park marked
a return to form for Skinny Puppy, after the rather confused and
disjointed effort of Rabies. Once more, Key, Goettel and Ogre
combined their individual qualities to create an album with a powerful, congruent sound,
and a strong conceptual unity. The music balances on the line between noisy cacophony and
melodic harmony much in the vein of the albums preceding Rabies, but on Too Dark
Park everything is a little more raw. On the lyrical side, Ogre again
juxtaposed the circumstances of his own condition with those of the world in general. The
red thread running through all the songs is pollution, however, in Ogre's
rhetoric, the concept of pollution is not only an environmental concern, but equally a
psychological, physical and spiritual matter.
The cover of Too Dark
Park was the first to feature the art of Jim Cummins (I, Braineater)
-- a host of ghoulish creatures floating in a blue void. And, as a homage perhaps, the
album opens with the rather brutal track "Convulsion," which features a sample
of a voice repeating: "He's seeing monsters, he's losing his mind, and he's feeling
it going." Together with "Convulsion," the very convoluted lyrics of
"Tormentor" seem to revolve around psychological breakdown. However, whereas the
former song is an all-out, aggressive noise attack, "Tormentor" is a slower,
more structured and melodic piece.
"Tormentor" was Skinny
Puppy's first single release off Too Dark Park, and the next track --
"Spasmolytic" -- was their second. "Kicking the habit!" Ogre
repeatedly yells in a coarse voice, and in the lyrical context of the song, "the
habit" refers not only to drug addiction, but also to the numerous habits that
constitute what most people call daily life. "Spasmolytic" again displays the
more chaotic side of Skinny Puppy, with an intense boiler-room-beat
dominating and suppressing the harmonious synth theme that continuously lurks right
beneath the surface of the song.
Carrying on the sound of
"Spasmolytic," with unrelenting percussion and a strong synth theme of Middle
Eastern flavor, "Rash Reflection" is a further indictment of the hollow
lifestyle and spiritual climate of the world. The lyrics are narrated by Ogre,
with the line "Kiss the master's feet" screamed out at steady intervals -- the
'master' presumably being 'money,' the new God of the Western world.
With "Nature's
Revenge," Skinny Puppy completely changes pace. It is one of the
band's slowest songs, based on a beautiful melancholy synth theme with a minimal amount of
percussion and effects, and the soothing presence of an acoustic guitar. Ogre
performs his lyrics in a fitfully world-weary and frail voice. Again, the words are rather
ambiguous and difficult, but it appears that "Nature's Revenge" sums up the
themes of the first four songs on the album, while setting the stage for the second half. Ogre
seems to equate the 'pollution' of self with the greater environmental pollution
going on in the world.
"Shore Lined
Poison" brings the album into the dark heart of the park. Opening with a downbeat
theme that sounds like a subdued dirge, the song soon develops into a powerful, melodic
and very layered piece, dominated by crashing percussions and synth effects. Ogre
yells his vocals in competition with the strong currents of sound; the vocals are centered
around environmental decline, but in usual kaleidoscopic fashion, everything from the
threats of nuclear annihilation to media brainwashing is pulled into the song. There is a
strong atmosphere of catastrophy and finality in this song, and towards the end all hell
breaks loose with alarms and sirens piercing the already dense soundscape, and Ogre
sounding overwhelmed and resigned in the face of it all.
Also featuring a powerful
beat and melodic synth airs, "Grave Wisdom" almost sounds like part 2 of
"Shore Lined Poison." Ogre's vocals are more subdued and controlled,
but still centered around environmental decay, and performed with a strong sense of
urgency.
The punk-oriented driving
guitars and drums of the next track "T.F.W.O." harks back to Rabies, and
indeed the song feels out of place on Too Dark Park, especially sandwiched between
two songs with strong thematic and stylistic affinities. The topic of Ogre's
vocals returns to drug addiction, and in his execution of these Ogre sounds like
a rambling madman. "T.F.W.O." ends abruptly with a stream of jingly synths that
lead straight into "Morpheus Laughing."
Returning to the territory
of "Shore Lined Poison" and "Grave Wisdom," "Morpheus
Laughing" had a crisp synth theme coursing through it, punctuated by power
percussions, and supporting a true call for civil disobedience. The tone of the vocals, as
Ogre runs down a long list of injustices and ills of the world, is indignant, and
the the world view presented is more than bleak. The song dissolves into
"Reclamation," which closes the album.
As if nothing is left to say
after "Morpheus Laughing," the vocals are all but totally washed out on the
closing track. "Reclamation" is a mounting construction of noise, discordant
thematic fragments, and percussions hovering on the brink of complete randomness. The
piece builds into an apocalyptic blast of cacophony, and then slowly dies away.
Too Dark Park may not
be the best Skinny Puppy album, but it is probably the most
fully thematically realized. The nihilistic qualities of the lyrics, and the strong sense
of despair and closure that dominates the album, made it seem likely that this would be
the final release from the band, however, the more musically experimental Last Rights
followed.
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