Metz ‎- Atlas Vending – VINYL LP

Description

“METZ isn’t hooky in the traditional sense of the word, but their appeal is immediate as that of any pop band. Years before Shellac and Hot Snakes broke their hiatuses, the Toronto trio’s Sub Pop debut proudly kept the bad vibes going for antisocialites who didn’t care to pledge full allegiance to hardcore, punk, noise, or indie rock. If Steve Albini producing their 2017 album Strange Peace didn’t move the needle much, it’s only because you might’ve assumed he did the other ones too. And yet, Strange Peace started to renege on the promises Alex Edkins made two years earlier on II: that METZ would never hire a big producer, clean up their sound, or make anything accessible enough for radio. Three years later, Atlas Vending verges even closer to “accessible” and “expansive.” For better or worse, the snare tone is still their best hook.

But what a snare tone. It’s about the first thing heard on the opening “Pulse,” a form of “grimy, airless 200-cap venue” vérité so antithetical to a typical studio-produced sound that it comes off like CGI—as if Hayden Menzies is banging oil drums inside a meat locker, which itself in inside a well, which itself is inside a cave. Getting on METZ’s wavelength has always required a miserabilist bent, and the insistent beat is self-explanatory: It’s the pulse of a man whose heart pumps coffee sludge, steel shavings, and malevolence, soldiering on in the hopes that tolerance for pain might amount to something useful. (…)” – pitchfork.com

Tracklist :

A1 Pulse
A2 Blind Youth Industrial Park
A3 The Mirror
A4 No Ceiling
A5 Hail Taxi
B1 Draw Us In
B2 Sugar Pill
B3 Framed By The Comet’s Tail
B4 Parasite
B5 A Boat To Drown In