Micro-Reviewery 7: Richard Orofino, Mathrcool, Mother Room

 

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Richard Orofino – Witches

New York bedroom singer-songwriter Richard Orofino understands that the best music gets its point across and gets the hell out. Take the opener “Dirty”: charming vocal melodies and short noise noodle solos are squeezed into an elegantly dirty two minute package. The first half artfully plods and pops with grungy pop skills, with the subtle dissonance of the title track standing out. When track four hits, acoustics take over and the drums back off. This honestly made me go back and replay the first three tracks repeatedly for about half an hour, but eventually I overcame my electric guitar biases and finished the remaining tracks. They were pretty good.

A-

Mathrcool – Mathrcool

This weird electronic noise album is more frustrating than interesting. Synths and drum samples go off all over the place, from smooth ambient exercises to digital blast beat madness. “SUPERHEAVYDUTYAIDS” and “OUTOFTIMELSODLC” are all driving synth melodies and cool overdriven drum plows, but there’s too much throwaway hipster harsh noise you’ve heard a million times over. Even grosser: the actual guitar on “ARCTICMONKEYSAREFUCKIGNSHITESZ”. Probably a bad joke that I’m too unhip to understand.

C+

Mother Room – Randolph Sessions

Earth worship’s cool again since it’s already twelve years passe, so guitar droners Mother Room benefit. Taken from a live session, these guys have an electronic mixing setup that gives their guitar throbbing a cool blizzard static backdrop. The ideas end there, but I’ll trip to that.

B-

Rodent Blowjob Holocaust – My Momma Got AIDS From a Crack-Pipe

I always forget cybergrind is a thing, but thankfully My Momma Got AIDS From a Crack-Pipe is here to remind us that anyone with FL Studios can live out their goregrind dreams. Sadly, it doesn’t match my fond memories of Libido Airbag’s 2001 classic Barrel Blow Job. Maybe that’s because Rodent Blowjob Holocaust has discernible guitar riffs, a shocking misstep on the band’s part. The whole musicality thing ends up hurting what should be an anti-everything style; who wants decently played guitar over sloppy down-tuned synth farts?

C-