Index for Potential Suicide "Sex, Violence, Whatever - The Complete Recordings" CD
[Alone]
Here's the complete discography from this short-lived and atypical grinding/screamo act (that's just for reference, general sound aside there's nothing about the general content here that's all that "screamo").  Included herein is "The Newest Youth Rebellion" CD, the split 7" with Usurp Synapse, and the self-titled 7"; as well as demo, compilation, and unreleased recordings.  In their own words the band was influenced by the likes of Throbbing Gristle and Bastard Noise, the latter of which is more evident than the former (granted there are a lot of noisy elements and some tracks like "Remote Controls and Mousepads" and "Escape Unsuccessful", among many others, do lean more towards an experimental noise style), and I have to say that considering that they had members go on to form The Disease and The Avenging Disco Godfathers of Soul, this is certainly better than either of those bands.  Expect wickedly harsh vocal screams over a musical palette that draws as much from bottom heavy distorted bass bashings and slower sludgy tempos as it does from faster and more frantic dissonance and chaotic changes.  That variety definitely helps carry the work along nicely, and while some of this stuff is definitely not my thing, I can't deny that songs like the aptly titled "Rock Out With Your Cock Out" that have a little more of a tangible thread going on are pretty forceful.  I'm not really into the keyboards when they sound more musical, as in "Escape From Uncle Bill's Lap", but that's pretty rare, and the fact that there are actually some pretty straightforward metal riffs on this thing kind of makes up for that (check out the death metal-esque tremolo picking in "A Bag of Mustard and Water").  The songs seem to have become more involved as the band grew, but you can tell that their general concepts didn't really change very much over the years - they were always all over the place from little 20-second spurts of random noises and electronics to three-minute compositions that possess more structure and actual songwriting involvement.  Most of the recordings are solid for what the band offers.  Despite intentional rawness (to varying degrees) the mixes tend to be as even as necessary and the tones all fit.  There's a lot of warm density and gritty texture over most everything, though the percussion is pretty fluid.  But I love that the bass is generally a very prominent force in the rhythmic nature of the music, and the playing is definitely tighter than average - which always pays off.  Also cool is that there's a lot of variety to the way things are placed and whatnot, since there are certain tracks that are much noisier and less structured, so there are always details shifting and changing throughout all of the material.  Some of the older stuff uses a drum machine and is much thinner in sound quality, but that time period makes up the vast minority of the collection as a whole, so even though it's a little harder to swallow it's definitely rightfully included for completionist purposes.  The layout looks good and includes photos, liner notes, images of the original releases, etc.  All in all it's been excellently documented and makes for an interesting little read.  The only gripe I have is that they seem to have forgotten to credit exactly which songs came from which release.  I figured out the tracklists to the split with Usurp Synapse and "The Newest Youth Rebellion" CD online, but that's about all the documentation I could find.  No lyrics are included either, but I'm guessing that doesn't matter.  Pretty much my only complaint with the entire release is that I'd like to have seen a more specific indication of where the tracks were originally released, etc.  But fuck it.  Fans of the band and those who are generally into this quirky and noisy style should be pretty fond of this.  I tend to be very critical of this approach, but I have to give credit where due and state that these guys were better than average.  I doubt many people will spin this thing in its entirety for the whole 63-minutes on a regular basis, and from what I can tell "The Newest Youth Rebellion" (by far the band's strongest work) is still readily available, but... hey, if this is what you dig, there's plenty of digging to be done here. (6/10)
Running time - 63:40, Tracks: 39
[Notable tracks: Flavor of the Month, Global Injustice, Rock Out With Your Cock Out, How to Build a Silencer for a Semi-Automatic Weapon, A Bag of Mustard and Water]
Alone Records - http://www.alonerecords.com

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