Aight...I've had some time to give this album a few spins. It's actually kind of hard to judge an album like this because of how it was released. Like I said yesterday I was somewhat suspicious that all this free-of-labels thing would turn artists like Trent into music producing machines wherein things that probably wouldn't have been released will now be released. A lot. At some point or another, a label does serve the purpose of releasing things they think will sell. This can be at odds with an artists creative vision (witness the problematic release of Bowie's Low) but ultimately, to quote somebody I don't recall "I can't define art, but I know it when I see it".
Thus brings us to The Slip. Trent's 'gift' to fans for supporting him through the years. There's no doubt this is a very interesting idea. Sort of like the time Prince more or less gave away his album in the London times (of course, said paper paid him quite a bit of money for the privilege to do so). The simple fact of the matter is that this is by no means a mainstream pop album. No hit singles here. It sounds almost impossible to convincingly reproduce live, and some of the riffs sound like rehashing from the previous two non-Ghost albums (1,000,000 and Only from With Teeth?). That said, there are some really good things here. Lights in the Sky is a very gothier than thou vibe that is straight outta something from Trent's 90's stuff. The guitar/bass riff in Four of Us are Dying is classic Trent.
But what's up with all the glitchy lap-topish sounding percussion? Where did all that noisy metal on metal from The Downward Spiral and The Fragile go? Did somebody trick Trent into thinking those were bad things? I've been bitching about this since Year Zero. All the percussion (save for that big noisy snare he uses here) sounds really dry and it sucks the depth out of it. You can tell it's a stylistic decision but I'm not hip to it. Not yet at least.
So that said...my take (as of right now, I did an about face with Year Zero too if I recall so take it for what its worth) is that left unencumbered, Trent's noise to signal ratio gets a little dilluted. There's nothing remotely close to the weight or songwriting quality of The Day the Whole World Went Away, Wish, Hurt or Head Like A Hole here (although to be fair, I don't think that was the intention). Nope, what we have here are a bunch of fragmented tunes that, while there are interesting moments, won't be anything he'll hang his hat on. They are intricate no doubt. I can hear a lot of things going on...but with this sort of music, Trent was the forerunner in showing how less can be more. The point is, just because something is a programming extravaganza with crazy vocal edits and jagged guitar lines doesn't mean the song is good. Sometimes it works here, like on Demon Seed, but for the most part, it sounds like the self indulgent trip it most likely was/is.
I really wish Trent would swing for the fences in stripping things down and writing some really deep anthemic songs that all of us Gen X'ers remember him for doing. While I think its great he's making a strong case for succeeding business-wise on his own, a HUGE fuck-you to the industry comes when his output can speak to generations without a label propping it up.
So, I guess it's certainly worth checking out. If you're an old school industrial fan, there's plenty of glitchy noise and 'oh woe is me' lyrics here.
In other news, I procured the following items today:
and
The latter is a light that mounts inside a tent via magnets. Basically, the pannier bike is complete. A lot of this is the direct result of me getting out of that 1600 dollar chunk of fines that the Illinois Tollbooths tried to levy against me since my iPass apparently wasn't working/deducting properly (after waiting 45 minutes on hold, I found this was because they never officially changed the plates assigned to it from my temp ones when I bought the car). The net result of which is that whole clusterfuck ended up really only costing about a hundred bucks. This is a good thing because it looks like the weekend of the 22nd will be the maiden voyage in this project. I'm told I have a posse although I would not be suprised in the slightest if this ends up being me myself and I. No matter. I'll pick up all other pertinent supplies (sleeping bag, mattress, potential cooking supplies) at my parents house next weekend (I'm going to get some serious rides in next weekend fyi). In other words...everything is falling into place.
Ministry in 2 days....whoohoo!