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HR 010
Mental Anguish — Over The Border C60 |
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review of Over The Border from Factsheet Five, Issue #15, 1985
REVIEW by Jerry Kranitz
The second set of Chris Phinney’s Mental Anguish solo project finds him armed with new gear, including Korg Poly 800 and a new AudioTechnica 4 track, 6 channel mixer. Unlike the first tape (‘Better Pull That Plug’), which included two side long improvisations, ‘Over The Border’ features a dozen tracks, all under seven minutes.
‘Neon Dilemma’ is a tasty opener with electro beats, claps, and an ethereal synth melody. But when ‘Restless Souls’ kicks in we’re rockin’ in space, with jamming/exploratory guitar and cosmic rising/falling/soaring synth. The vocals are similar to Phinney’s street poet style from Skoptzies, though not as aggressive.
The electro beats are beats are back on ‘Time To Go’, setting a robotic groove and accompanied by potently intense drone waves and an almost jazzy and totally cosmic jamming vibe, along with heavily efx’d punk-poet vocals. Totally spaced out with an industrial punk edge. I hear elements of pleasant 80s synth pop on ‘Vietnam Serenade’, but Phinney has lots of crazy aggressive industrial action going on too. There’s this core pop theme, accompanied by blazing and rumbling effects, and past the halfway mark we hear various voice and war samples. ‘Vietnam’ + ‘Serenade’ INDEED!
‘Fine Time To Tell Me’ features a nifty combo of robotic beats and melodic yet aggressive sounding synth melody. It’s got both an industrial pop and jamming feel. Phinney says this is one of his favorite tracks of the set because it showcases all he was learning about programming beats and how to use the new synth, efx, recorder, sequencer, and mixing.
‘Dance Of The Home’ is very different and took me pleasantly by surprise. We’ve got an African woman’s chorus sample, tribal ethnic percussion, a tinkling melody, a flute-like recorder melody, weird alien bird chirping effects, and a lightly atmospheric melody. Lots going on and very interesting. ‘Torture Time’ is a killer glom of off-kilter rhythms and freaked out spacey vibes that set the pace for a punk-poet rant. It has a nice groove, in a choppity-chop mess-with-yer-head way. ‘New Frontier’ has a free-wheeling, multi-layered, symphonically surreal space vibe plus voice samples and a bugle blowing reveille.
For ‘Serene Dream’ we’re back in territory similar to ‘Dance Of The Home’. A whistling recorder melody and ethnic percussion are accompanied by a pulsating electronic pattern, cavernous atmospherics and other effects. ‘If The Time Is Right 4-U’ is a peppy, upbeat electro pop number with an industrial edge and punk-poet vocals. ‘Bhopal’, which is inspired by the Union Carbide gas tragedy in India, is another song with a core 80s synth-pop theme, but it’s nicely spaced out with all kinds of cosmic swirly action. I like how the steadily rocking drum beat dominates in the mix.
Finally, ‘Riceshitter’, which Phinney considered a Whitehouse tribute, is a monster freak-out cauldron of space effects and scream ranting. All the best Dik Mik audio generator bits from Hawkwind’s ‘Space Ritual’ tailor made for the Industrial-Punk crowd!!!
INTERVIEW with Chris Phinney by Kranitz
JK: So Over The Border… what made you decide to go back to doing Mental Anguish?
CP: I’d been wanting to do it for a long time. We had time in between. And I had my own gear now. I didn’t have to borrow the Akai open reel-to-reel. I had my own gear and decided I wanted to record electronic music. And I’m going to be quite honest with you. After listening to that tape [Over The Border]… it’s a good tape, but it’s also a bad tape because the mixing is horrible. The drums are way too loud and the keys are way too low. But I was learning. For some reason I could mix the band better than I could my own stuff at that point in time.
JK: Interesting. You noted in your email about the new gear… A Korg Poly 800, effects, a new recorder, and an Audio Technical 4-track. Was that a cassette 4-track?
CP: Yeah, cassette 4-track.
JK: And that was all new as of Over The Border?
CP: It was new with Wait Till The Drugs Kick In as well.
JK: The gear must have really made a difference. I had made the comment “definitely in a new Mental Anguish realm here”. But it also makes sense that after having done all these tapes in a band and now going back to recording solo, you certainly at least had more experience.
CP: Right. I had more experience, and a different approach as well. But like I said the mixdown was terrible on that. In my opinion. I’m my own worst critic.
JK: But listening to it from my standpoint, I’m hearing a cool range of variety. Looking at my notes we go from ‘Neon Dilemma’ with “electro beat with claps and ethereal synth melody”, and then ‘Restless Souls’ and “We’re rockin’ in space now, with jamming/ exploratory guitar and cosmic rising/falling/soaring synth”. And I added how the vocals are sorta the street poet but not as aggressive as the earlier tapes. ‘Vietnam Serenade’… “I hear elements of pleasant 80s synth pop”. So you’ve got a lot of variety here. And you may not like the mix but it sounds like you’re experimenting with multiple tracks and learning about mixing and incorporating effects.
CP: Right. Learning how to use the gear better.
JK: Is this the first tape where you did much of that?
CP: Yeah, it’s the first track that I recorded one track at a time.
JK: I’m chuckling at my notes for ‘Riceshitter’: “A monster freakout glom of space effects and scream-ranting. All the best Dik Mik audio generator bits from Hawkwind’s Space Ritual…
CP: You heard all that! (laughs)
JK: and you responded… Whitehouse style tribute.
CP: It was kind of a White house ripoff style on the screaming and ranting and feedback. But I was also listening to Hawkwind at the same time. So I get where you heard the Dik Mik stuff because I was trying to do that as well. That’ll come up later with some Karcass material you’ve never heard.
CP: I’d been wanting to do it for a long time. We had time in between. And I had my own gear now. I didn’t have to borrow the Akai open reel-to-reel. I had my own gear and decided I wanted to record electronic music. And I’m going to be quite honest with you. After listening to that tape [Over The Border]… it’s a good tape, but it’s also a bad tape because the mixing is horrible. The drums are way too loud and the keys are way too low. But I was learning. For some reason I could mix the band better than I could my own stuff at that point in time.
JK: Interesting. You noted in your email about the new gear… A Korg Poly 800, effects, a new recorder, and an Audio Technical 4-track. Was that a cassette 4-track?
CP: Yeah, cassette 4-track.
JK: And that was all new as of Over The Border?
CP: It was new with Wait Till The Drugs Kick In as well.
JK: The gear must have really made a difference. I had made the comment “definitely in a new Mental Anguish realm here”. But it also makes sense that after having done all these tapes in a band and now going back to recording solo, you certainly at least had more experience.
CP: Right. I had more experience, and a different approach as well. But like I said the mixdown was terrible on that. In my opinion. I’m my own worst critic.
JK: But listening to it from my standpoint, I’m hearing a cool range of variety. Looking at my notes we go from ‘Neon Dilemma’ with “electro beat with claps and ethereal synth melody”, and then ‘Restless Souls’ and “We’re rockin’ in space now, with jamming/ exploratory guitar and cosmic rising/falling/soaring synth”. And I added how the vocals are sorta the street poet but not as aggressive as the earlier tapes. ‘Vietnam Serenade’… “I hear elements of pleasant 80s synth pop”. So you’ve got a lot of variety here. And you may not like the mix but it sounds like you’re experimenting with multiple tracks and learning about mixing and incorporating effects.
CP: Right. Learning how to use the gear better.
JK: Is this the first tape where you did much of that?
CP: Yeah, it’s the first track that I recorded one track at a time.
JK: I’m chuckling at my notes for ‘Riceshitter’: “A monster freakout glom of space effects and scream-ranting. All the best Dik Mik audio generator bits from Hawkwind’s Space Ritual…
CP: You heard all that! (laughs)
JK: and you responded… Whitehouse style tribute.
CP: It was kind of a White house ripoff style on the screaming and ranting and feedback. But I was also listening to Hawkwind at the same time. So I get where you heard the Dik Mik stuff because I was trying to do that as well. That’ll come up later with some Karcass material you’ve never heard.