REQUIEM

A full sensory experience is something that Requiem offers in spades. The sonic soundscapes they produce are bursting at the seams with each track dripping from compositional saturation. Not relying solely on sound alone, the visual aspect of their work is as equally important. Both sound and imagery are a source of creative inspiration, something for which their shows have become renowned. Enjoying unusual and strange venues to perform in, the opener ‘Tired Hot and Bothered’ sounds like it is being performed in a cavernous, abandoned warehouse. Its crushed beats and waves of blinking sonic light permeate in all directions.

Like a solo guitarist jamming on the altar of a church sanctuary, the ecclesiastical ‘Suddenly I Have Dreadful Urge To Be Happy’ in its rhythmic simplicity is a hypnotic track. The slow and calculated intro to ‘Things Mark Twain Didn’t Say’ takes incremental steps in its development. Shoegaze at its heart, the textured synth and looped drum frills, repeatedly lurch back and forth in a slow dance.

Long track titles aren’t the only thing Requiem can produce as ‘I Can’t Help But Think I’m Starting To Lose The War’ takes an industrial excursion through mind and body as this expansive song oscillates between light and heavy, black and white, providing a blank canvas from which to draw one’s own parallels. Written as a cathartic piece to process grief and mourning, ‘Deadwood’ embodies a lifeforce. The deep electronic drone runs through its core, flanked by graceful waves of synth whilst the balancing force of drums gathers in strength to reach a climax and final place of acceptance.

Ready to roll up its sleeves and slug it out, the bold, defiant, and energizing ‘Humane Technology’ is a thumping industrial-electro track. Playing with time signatures as Requiem clearly enjoy, ‘Immaculate Inning’ hop, skips, and jumps in a chaotically ordered way. The subtle ripple of ‘Accelerated Dreaming’ with its free-form jazz breaks ever so slowly surges into totality as a sonic sphere ultimately envelopes. The dichotomy of ‘Utopia Or Oblivion’ wrestles with the notion via sound as both drum and synth duke it out in a contest to declare a sonic and sentimental winner. Moving from jangled clutter to clarity and high fidelity, the closing track ‘Our Common Welfare’ stands tall. Peering stoically across the sonic soundscapes that preceded it, the final moments of the record are reflective as much as they are optimistic.

The evocative forces Requiem dispense is remarkable, particularly so given the relatively narrow musical palette they draw upon to conjure such powerfully emotive tracks. A brilliant record and one that could only be superseded by experiencing it live.