The image quickly
became a widely circulated spectacle due to its irony; a pinnacle of
commoditization and late-stage capitalism, sitting upon the final
resting place of its most enduring critic. Perhaps also a quiet
indicator of recession-era consumption, it acted almost as a punch line
to a joke no one was aware was being set up. In doing so, it captures
the absurdity on both sides. Farveblind’s new album operates within that
same paradox, challenging a system that consumes everything, including
dissent.
Named
after the Danish word for colourblind, Farveblind flesh out their
industrial, techno leanings as if sharpening a proverbial knife on their
debut album, Micro Pleasures. “Oh
I’ve quit smoking,” Andre stated confidently to his bandmates once,
“But I want this little one thing. It’s not an addiction, it’s just a
little pleasure. Just a micro pleasure.”
The
album explores the claustrophobic routine and mundanity of day-to-day
life, especially under the constraining logic of capitalism. Micro Pleasures
draws attention to humble pleasures, coping mechanisms, and acts of
quiet resistance in society that we cling to like life rafts.
Having already established themselves through incendiary live performances, Farveblind prove equally formidable in the studio. With mastering handled by Gustav Brunn (Viagra Boys, Yung Lean), the album achieves a superior sound that hones their already semi-established identity. Explosive and intricate, it skirts the edge of over-stimulation without ever tipping into fatigue, and situates the album in an urbane, almost brutalist landscape. I can only imagine what it’s going to sound like live.
Kicking
off with the springy, off-kilter patterns of “Knocking Down Your Door”
(feat Itcallsme i), the album eagerly establishes its kinetic energy and
tonal intent. “Salary Man” follows with a sardonic take on America’s
modern white-collar workaholic. The beat culminates at its apex around 3
minutes in, to a spinning breakdown that mirrors the exhaustion it
describes, like a hamster wheel you can’t escape, tripping you up as you
go, yet demanding you keep moving.
The album’s fixation on the habitudes
of capitalism and their consequences spills into “Things” (feat. K.
Flay): “I am feral with a virile need to buy things, to hoard things… to
break things… to love things and revile things.” Driven by a bass-heavy
electropunk
pulse, K. Flay’s monotone deadpan delivery accentuates the inclinations
inherent and itching under our skin; how reflexive and unthinking they
have become. Who exactly are we feeding when we satiate these urges? Are
we doing ourselves any favors, or are these micro pleasures keeping us
stuck in the rat race? It’s the hamster wheel again, and we are feeding
into the very thing that is eating us.
“These
Days” leans further into revolving, techno-driven gestalts, with
colorful beats parading before you in its undertone. It brings the album
into a more brutalist atmosphere; concrete, subterranean, and
semi-concealed.
Emmeline’s
haunting vocals transcend the beats they’re superimposed on in “Natural
Behavior”. The bass gallops at the chorus before the track lifts and
spirals outward, spinning and chanting, with Emmeline impressing upon us
at the end, “and you’re at the center of the universe and everything…
arrives… at you.”
By
the penultimate track, the album runs itself out into natural
exhaustion, collapsing into the final ambient track, “All of the Atoms”
(feat Django Django), which is a change of pace, but refreshingly cooling. It feels in deference to some of Low’s HEY WHAT
album, and is transcendent as a track in the spaciousness and
existentialism it evokes. Some tracks (“Micro Pleasures” and “Heartbreak
Beats”) echo the alarming and undulating early 2000s beats of The
Prodigy’s classic sound.
Excavating
in nature, the groundbreaking beats shake loose anything calcified in
the quantity of your core, and leave you harmoniously empty by its final
track. Taken altogether, the record feels like a gradual peel away from
the state they’re criticizing. By the end of it, you’ve been placed at a
dizzying standstill at its drop off, and perhaps that is the last
irony, the cherry on top of the cake, or the Labubu on Karl Marx’s
grave.
