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Released
1998

Label
Iris Light

Reviewed by
Michael C. Lund

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Sonic Subjunkies


Iris Light
55 Hawkens Way
St. Columb Major
Cornwall  TR9 6SS
UK

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Last Edit/Update
23 september, 1998

Sonic Subjunkies

MOLOTOV LOUNGE

         
Track Listing

1. Intro
2. Welcome To Central Industrial
3. Das Elektrophon
4. Suicide Box
5. Do You Even Know Who You Are?
6. Statement
7. Your Friend The Machine
8. Live From Jonestown
9. Destroy
10. 12 000 RPM
11. Railton Road Blues

          Sonic Subjunkies' first full-length -- Molotov Lounge -- includes a track entitled "12.000 RPM," but it might as well have been "12.000 BPM," because this release has more beats per square millimeter than any other CD that I can remember. And, not only do Sonic Subjunkies' music speed along at an acceleration rate that is nothing short of dizzying, their beats are also bassy, distorted and dense as lead, landing with resounding impacts like so many punches to the gut. On several of the tracks further oomph is added to this already explosive cocktail, by loops of some of some of the meaner and more metallic guitar riffs on the music scene today. The picture should be pretty clear: This is an album's worth of complete and utter percussion-oriented mayhem.
          At the hazardous pace at which Sonic Subjunkies travel, it is perhaps not surprising that their music in large part depicts the world a few hours in the future. Most of Hollywood's output of sci-fi movies from recent years have been positively pillaged, in the band's search for samples to paint their scathingly dystopic portrait of tomorrow's society. In the course of the CD, the listener is thus taken on a virtual tour of some of the exciting things the future has in store for us. The first stop, on "Welcome to Central Industrial," is a maximum security correctional facility that is presented by a cold, 'female' computer voice as the latest in "humane containment." On "Elektrophon," a German sample presenting some kind of intelligent machine is repeated throughout. "Suicide Box" features a conversation between a woman and such a 'thinking machine,' which revolves around the computer's alleged ability to instigate and predict the woman's suicide. Then on "Do You Even Know Who You Are?" the discussion turns to memory erasure and implants, while "Your Friend The Machine" is another presentation of a man-made intelligence. Sonic Subjunkies' music is certainly not without humor, but neither is their satire without intent. On the brief piece "Statement" -- which occupies the very center of the CD -- a bewildered scientist contemplates the importance of controversy, and Molotov Lounge could without doubt open many a debate on the present technological developments, and the direction of Western culture as such.
          Whether experienced for its prophetic musings, its irreverent and tongue-in-cheek recycling of popular media, or, as this year's most lethal invitation to approach the dance floor, Molotov Lounge is a great CD. The English label Iris Light is once more responsible for releasing an intelligent, unique and highly compelling album of electronic music.

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