| Katsurei - Hoshi O Miru |
| There
aren't that many bands that can do quietly unsettling anymore. The
assorted permutations of metal can try their damnedest, but usually end
up tipping their hand with varying degrees of violence and overstated darkness.
Psych bands shoot for the uncanny from time to time, but normally find
greener pastures in positive transcendence or traditional fuzzout. Some
days, it all seems so…obvious. Maybe this trend towards wearing your
intentions on your sleeve is due to a general decline in subtlety
brought on by widespread cultural ADD, where there's so much damned
stuff out there that if you don't establish your personality, like,
yesterday, you'll be instantly passed over in the name of getting to
the next thing on the incessantly regenerating mountain of new stuff.
In this climate, asking for even a minute of the listener's time can
seem overly demanding. Fifteen minutes of fame? More like fifteen
seconds, tops. With 星を見る (Hoshi O Miru, i.e. Seeing Stars,) Katsurei dips their languid, patient, creepy, and deceptively unassuming toe into this overwhelmingly hyperactive barrage. It's been nearly a quarter century since Paradaise K (sic,) their spindly, nervous debut, and if anything, Hoshi O Miru sees them even more on edge. But there's something glacially slow, rock solid and not quite right about the band's sound, as if nerves have sapped every ounce of available energy, leaving a tightly wound, intense wreck. It's simultaneously spare, inert, unrelenting, and deeply unnerving, like the sweaty, wide eyed guy on the train that won't stop staring. At its best, Hoshi O Miru is the sound of skin crawling. The slow, methodical vocals of Koji Shishido bring to mind the similarly intense delivery of Maria Kannon's Tosuke Kowata. But where Kowata feels like he's barely keeping himself from exploding, often unsuccessfully, Shishido sounds like he's killing himself just trying to keep from collapsing, a shambolic state the rest of the band shares. "リボンの騎士 (B Song Judge)" (i.e. "Ribbon Rider") sounds like a depressed Crazy Horse at its messiest; thrillingly sloppy, and about to disintegrate at the slightest provocation. The title track sounds downright exhausted with a slow, gently winding drift that would be blissful if it weren't so paranoid. "ルシアル" ("Lucille") is cut from the same cloth, slow and methodical with a strong layer of spiritual malaise. Those three tracks, each between ten and fifteen minutes a piece, are the heart of Hoshi O Miru. The template…a slow, dark burn that gradually unfolds into a slightly less dark peak…never gets enervating, thanks to unfailingly beautiful, fuzzed out solos from Shishido. Even when they offer a ray of light, it's a strangely somber light, but no less exhilarating for it: "Lucille's" solo, for example, is a circular, ecstatic wonder which spins off into the ether, brilliant flashes collapsing into a wobbly finish. Still, the eeriness remains, and it's not until the relatively upbeat closer "革命" ("Kakumei," i.e. "Revolution") that the sun starts to find its way between the cracks in the wall. The Crazy Horse comparison is probably the closest in terms of attack, but alongside the aforementioned Maria Kannon, Katsurei's spiritual brothers would have to be Les Rallizes Dénudés. While not as saturated in attention grabbing sheets of distortion, they similarly occupy a cloistered, hermetic world, one which can feel both huge and unbearably claustrophobic. Hoshi O Miru is not an album for impatient people, but for those willing to slow down and let a little darkness into their soul, it's enormously powerful. |