Too often in the (still) geeky-white-kid-dominated indie world, rhythm gets cast aside as a marginal sidekick to ambitions such as writing the perfect melody or scoring an NME-abetted college radio chart-topper. Dancepunk tried valiantly to remedy this but, in a way, only made things worse: Musicians who seemed to have little or no interest in a groove took a crash course in ESG and sought to control rhythm's basic tenets because it was the thing to do. As a result, the image of the awkward white kid sloppily banging out a rigid disco beat on a shitty drumset is now more farcical than endearing, and the fun of records like The Rapture's Echoes has been overshadowed by pale imitators. It's nice, then, that Codename: Dustsucker, built from the ground up on "found drumming" from ex-band member Mark Simnett and new tracks from Talk Talk's Lee Harris, thrives on and reveres rhythm rather than merely tinkering with or flat-out ignoring it.
Dustsucker arrives a decade after Bark Psychosis' previous album, Hex, and the band's subsequent dissolution. That 10-year hiatus may seem slight in a year in which Brian Wilson fans were relieved of their 37-year wait for Smile but, like the former Beach Boy, Bark Psychosis deliver. And, like Hex, Dustsucker sounds utterly unique, eschewing even the broadest classification.
This album is percussion-centric, and that's to say nothing of the temperance and agility of the drummers' playing. It's also an album smitten with texture, space, and silence, a seamless blend of acoustic instrumentation and electronic processing on which its piecemeal compositions generate massive momentum within predominantly slothful tempos. On "Shapeshifting", one can hear a constant push-and-pull between the acoustic and electronic elements, as plaintive strummed guitar nudges against a stiff drumbeat with metallic, Gamelan-like flourishes.
The record is also filled with huge, billowing clouds of resonance, which occasionally inundate its tracks in a morass of sustained sounds. "400 Winters" lingers and lingers, drawn out by massive amounts of reverb, plenty of held notes, and an ethereal underpinning of backward-looped vibraphone. Though melancholic, the song is ultimately too hopeful to be dragged down and it's easier to bask in its hazy formlessness than moan about its lack of variation. But while "400 Winters" manages to stay afloat, some tracks suffer from lethargy. "Inqb8tr" is opulently adorned in multiple layers of effects and textures, but is too congested to endure its eight-minute runtime.
But even when Dustsucker's songwriting falters, the percussion is distinct, lending direction to the record's stacked orchestration. "Reserve Shot Gunman" emerges from directionless darkness with a propulsive, vaguely Latin groove. A mercurial bassline gradually annexes notes until finding a melody that, in lieu of vocals, provides the track both a face and a backbone. "From What Is Said to When It's Read" incorporates huge, tympanic tom sounds as a kind of melodic element, while "Shapeshifting" rides an unflinching vamp through a two-minute coda that features no melody, only noisome sound effects and drums.
Dustsucker may be languorous and dense enough to put off those who are on edge, but even when the album grinds to a halt under its excessive weight the scenery is beatific. And what the songs lack in structural certainty or melodic eloquence they usually make up for in the remarkable depth and vibrancy of their textures. Considering the band's 10-year layoff, it's a somewhat understated return-- and one painted in broad strokes. But the album's unerring intimacy implores closer looks. In 2004, the fact that this record exists at all is significant, and fans of Hex should find plenty to like under its moody lightning.
