Independent Women are So Damned Good...

Review by Darren Kerr

This album is not for the unadventurous, the queasy or anyone suffering from the flu. This Sidney, B.C, band has oft been compared to NoMeansNo, and I'm sure that they're kindred spirits of Rob Wright and boys, but I hear a lot of Discipline-era King Crimson in the repetition of the band's patterns. They pummel you with constant relentless staccato meter to the point of mental anguish where you have to scream, "Aaaaahhh!! Stop fucking with my equilibrium!!!"

What, did I give the impression that this is a bad thing? The playing is brilliant throughout. Jason Bonneau's drumming is frenzied yet pinpoint precise, Bonneau's, Craig Vishek's and Colin Macrae's voices are like sarcastic doppelgängers of each other, so in sync you would think it's only one person, and the guitars of Vishek and Tolan "Snotfinger" Macneil are both dissonant chordal damage and jazz vivisection.

It's not all peaches and bile, though. Sometimes the band plumbs depths which I cannot fathom. "I Feel Fine" has mimicked verses which are just as annoying as that kid in grade school who would repeat everything you had just said. Other songs, like "Queen of the World" and "F.P.P.C.S." are both a blessing and a curse. Repeated listenings of "F.P.P.C.S." cause insomnia: I was awake for hours trying to get "You are anathema to me / I emasculate you from me" out of my head to no avail.

This is a difficult album to get a grip on, but it will get a grip on you. They'll sell you the whole building, but you only need the ledge.

Artist Contact Info: Wrong Records, P.O. Box 3243, Vancouver, B.C., V6B 3Y4, Canada