Ok first things first, this is defiantly not for everybody. 99.99% of people will hate this, refuse to even call it music and will condemn the creators and the listeners as sick freaks. Oh well fair enough, actually that’s a good thing, because really Whitehouse wouldn’t work in the mainstream, and they would probably be arrested as soon as the authorities got hold of the album sleeves.
The main problem that people have with Whitehouse is that a. they look for music when this is more a form of extreme sonic art. B. They immediately slam it for the lyrics and the concepts. C. it’s just plain unmistakable. Well it’s industrial Noise what do you expect. And not just any industrial noise, this is the original and for me the best noise act.
Whitehouse create layers of white and pink electronic noise that is augmented by William Bennetts and Philip Bests off the wall vocal delivery. But it is the utterly devastating lyrics that make them such a cult. Murder, Rape, extreme sexual violence, everything the tabloids are afraid to admit and refer to from a safe distance is flung right in your face as soon as you press the start button. To say that this album hit me hard would be an understatement, I thought mayhem were extreme but these guys make them look like Nirvana.
The first track Cruise(force the truth) crashes in Bennetts voice more oppressive and violent than ever. An example of the sort of lyrics is
“I’ve had to listen to these sick F**k invalids for what seems like my entire life and worse, I’ve wanted to buy what precious little they had to sell. Right now im seriously F**king sick of it seriously F**king tired of their filthy lies and half-brained sales stumbles and then their complete condescension. Im bored with their jobs and im sick of pitched second hand experience.”
They are very articulate and never simplify. You have to try and imagine the lyrics screamed at about eight times the speed. The track Movement 2000 is just a wall of static, but more dense than anything you could imagine. This goes on for exactly two minutes then stops. The next things you hear are twelve minutes of testimony from Rape victims, drug addicts, families of murdered children, all American for some reason. Im not sure what the significance of this track is, although you do get desensitised to the horrific tails you hear, which may be the point there trying to illustrate.
Scapegoat is pure noise, like crazed electrical cables going wild in a junk yard. Dance the desperate breath. If you’ve got this far in the CD this is the point you may turn off. The sound is just the ambient sounds of a shopping centre. Over which Bennett whispers about abducting a Mall rat and underfeeding her, until she dies of malnutrition. Not pleasant, however if you read the text and look beyond the obvious shock, some of it is very satirical in a rather twisted black comedy style.
So all in all, quite a ride, I can’t say I listen to this CD every day or even every week, but the point is, every time it is on, it effects, and that’s the same with most Whitehouse releases. You have been warned.
