There came a point during my first viewing of David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive that I simply couldn’t take any more. The film work and acting were engaging, but the story itself was so intentionally muddled that I found reaching the end impossible. However, the essential elements were still there, and to this day (after several viewings) I regard it with more curiosity than frustration.
Memories of Mulholland Drive flashed through my head as I listened to Tuner’s second LP, Pole. Halfway through the album, I had already gone from skeptical to humored; curious to transfixed. To experience the same parade of moods, one only has to get through the first five tracks of the album. Opening track “White Cake Sky” is actually the biggest disappointment of the record - it wrongly creates a tone reminiscent of cheesy early millenium nu-metal. The song is highlighted by some of the most simplistic and painful attempts at rapping over metal riffs you’re likely to find in 2008. Your frown doesn’t turn upside down for track two either, although it will titillate purveyors of the strange – “Black Well Monotony” starts out as a Marilyn Manson-esque metal romp split between some of the strangest percussion time signatures heard in a while.
The third track marks a shift toward the album’s true mood and signature. My first listen occurred in a grocery store - I ended up putting random combinations of hot sauce, bananas and foreign cheese into my cart before I realized what was sneaking into my brain. Imagine 1970’s-era David Bowie whispering the strangest things possible, dubbed over the soundtrack to an 80’s-themed porn starring Woody Allen. I’d describe the song in more detail, but I’m scared to listen any more and at ten minutes long, the track borders on genuine insanity.
Tuner do find their voice, finally falling into a sort of lockstep halfway through the album that more solidly defines their area of focus as somewhere in the prog-rock genre. As the album progresses you realize that it’s not meant to be a sensibly progressive album like The Mars Volta might create, but more of an insane journey through vast valleys of electronic doodads and filtered voices. To quote Ricky Gervais, “ it sounds like something you’d find written on the walls of an insane asylum. Except that it’s written in shit.” Just past the album’s halfway point, “Dig” sounds like a schizophrenic take on the theme song to Showtime’s Dexter with the addition of an eerie BDSM lesbian vocal that whispers indecipherably.
Despite all the seemingly negative adjectives used in this review, I would still recommend experiencing the album. It may horrify, intrigue, or even interest. But like a David Lynch film that someone will invariably find spellbinding, Pole creates a unique blend of strange. Most impressive is the fact that main contributors Pat Mastelotto and Markus Reuter are from the US and Germany respectively, yet managed to create such an eyebrow-raising collaboration. Not to mention the small harem of female vocal contributors, one of whom (Chrysta Bell) sings on the latest Lynch circus Inland Empire. This album needs a “safe word”.
-Brendan Kraft