I've Seen All I Need To See - The Body: Review
The Body
are a Rhode Island based experimental metal duo who have been active for over 20 years now. They initially worked in the realms of doom and sludge metal but over the years have expanded their sound into the worlds of noise and harsh electronic music. They are just as known for their multiple collaborations with artists like Full Of Hell, Thou and Uniform as much of their core studio discography.
Review By Lav:
I wasn't listening to The Body in their early days because I was just too young, but by the time I got a bit older the band had expanded their ambition and sound palette into something that really impressed me. In particular their 2018 album I Have Fought Against It, But I Can't Any Longer impressed me quite a bit with its instrumental ambition. On top of all this last year Lee Buford took part in an experimental super group that intrigued me with Sightless Pit. So it's safe to say that I was excited for this record but I wasn't quite prepared for what was coming. This is one of the harshest, most brain melting noise records I've heard come out in a long long time and I really enjoyed it.
The record is just 8 songs and under 40 minutes but it makes really good use of the time particularly right off the bat with the opener A Lament. It's an absolutely fucking brutal opening track with pounding distorted percussion lining almost every second of the song. The extended intro passage consists of some deep smoky spoken word reading a poem that is very much worth looking into its origin and history. From that point on the track devolves masterfully as the percussion becomes even harder to make out and the vocals turn into the bands trademark dissonant unintelligible screams. The final two minutes of the song introduces clearer louder explosions of cymbals for a chaotic and intense 5 minutes and I love every second of it. Next up is Tied Up And Locked In the only song on the record that runs under 3 minutes. The track has an even messier mix with all the instrumentation eventually work its way into the hazy distorted mess that backs the song. Even the vocals are barely given any room to breathe and it makes the blood curdling screams honestly sound kind of tame. The song is abstract but unmistakably intense.
Eschatological Initiative kicks off the song with percussion that is honestly the first clearly observable thing on the record as the simple pattern is easy to make out and the distortion is eased up a bit. The vocals are switched up a bit on the track too so when they emerge in the quieter moments it also feels new and unique but what's even better about the song is how the instrumental develops. It feels like just as the steady crushing drums start to get dry the song explodes with a much more complicated array of instrumentation and screams into its high impact final few minutes. A Pain Of Knowing starts off with some long drawn out passages of heavy fuzz that almost start to feel like drone. The song has warped instrumental passages all over it that make for a texturally unique experience on the record. The only down side is that I don't think the song is one of the most compositionally exciting on the record especially for being almost 6 minutes long.
The City Is Shelled gets off to a bit of a slow start with a short guitar loop that run its course pretty quickly but sticks around for well over a minute. It gets lost in the explosion of percussion that follows and the song settles back into something more like the rest of the album but with a more versatile display of drumming. I love the high pitched squelching distortion popping off the cymbals and the more conventional metal vocals on the tracks second half. They Are Coming is up next and it doesn't waste any time with crashes of percussion and what I think are blown our vocals but they're so messy I can't even really tell. The track also has some production trickery working with sounds that phase in and out of the mix in a distinctly synthetic way. This helps the song stand out as one of the most grueling and intense moments on the record and another big highlight.
The Handle/The Blade comes through with clear fiery percussion that totally cuts through the mix and feels like the main focus of the track. I think the song had some vocal samples hanging in the background with the distant screams but it is impossible to make out almost anything they say. It has touches of both natural fuzz from the recording as well as some synthetic distortion but it builds up to a great second half with a devilish driving intensity. The closing track Path Of The Failure starts off like a Swans song with a short percussion loop that feels almost tribal and slowly guides the song into a dark pit of insanity as everything distorts until you can't make out anything anymore. It's disorienting as fuck and I love the thunder crashes of guitar and random flashy drumming that literally flies in and out of the mix. After the darker passage the song sort of reaches its apex with a surprisingly methodical climb back into its maximal but calculated core to serve as the conclusion of the song. It ends the record off on a wild, intense roller coaster.
I've Seen All I Need To See is a gripping, soul crushing experimental noise album that rarely gives the listener a moment to breathe, much less reflect on the intensity it delivers. The only negative thing I have to say about the record in any capacity is that despite its short runtime it does feel like it goes over a lot of the same territory. What it lacks in instrumental versatility however it mostly makes up for in songwriting and sheer brutality of the instrumental performances and mixing. This record is not for the inexperienced or feint of heart but if you're looking for something to beat you over the head relentlessly and slowly wear down your skull to a fine powder I can't think of a record more capable. 8.5/10
This cover is interesting and I'm not exactly sure what's going on even when I look at it closely. I like the way it's composed and the use of different styles of text adds to my sense of confusion. The black and white itself has a lot of contrast which I like but I don't think this cover is going to catch the attention of anyone outside the target audience. 6/10
