Blam Honey - Typical Ingeniousness

By 1-5

Release Date: 08/25/1999
Price: 2000 yen

My Rating

Sound Quality - 10/10
Length - 8/10
Songs - 9/10
Overall Score - 9/10!

Review

A combination of dark electro-industrial and electro-noise, this is "industrial gender unit" Blam Honey’s last release, the mini-album, "Typical Ingeniousness ~suggest~". This was their first release on Nippon Crown and the production quality is slightly better compared to their other releases.

The CD opens with the first of the six instrumental tracks (those tracks not in capital letters and "SUSPECT"), the abstract "oppresive paralysis". Perhaps it seems excessive to have more instrumental tracks than tracks with vocals, but each instrumental is totally different from the others. "oppresive paralysis" is a powerful intro track that, although difficult to describe, mixes noise synths with melodies wonderfully. The track is also very atmospheric and it’s hard not to conjure up images of a desolate and strange futuristic landscape when listening to it.

Unlike "oppresive paralysis" , the next instrumental, "myasthenia" is a very slow and harmonious song with an almost ethereal quality to it. Completely contrasting that is "SUSPECT", a faster track with a dark electro-industrial sound. That is again totally different to the next one, "electroence phalogram", which is essentially a noise synth track. If you don’t like that kind of music it could be a little irritating, but I think it’s short enough that it won’t get to that point, and if you listen to it carefully and hear all the sounds that go together to create it it’s a really interesting track.

The fifth instrumental, "solve" is perhaps not as good as the other five. It’s pretty much just the same sound repeated for 40 seconds with a slight change at the end. However, it does have a something of a hypnotic effect on you after a while and actually becomes quite relaxing in a strange way. Then comes the final instrumental track and final track of the mini-album, "sequela", which is quite similar to "myasthenia" in that it’s a quiet and gentle track with subtle noise synths in the background. It really suits the title ("sequela" means an aftereffect of a disease, injury or treatment) and you can easily imagine the melody to be the peacefulness of the body and the noise synths to be the aftereffect.

"CHANGING SPOUT IN MY HEAD", is the first track on the mini-album featuring TATSUYA’s voice. He has an interesting vocal style changing between a smooth, soft speaking voice, an odd half-singing voice and deeper, almost growling vocals. This contrast in styles is also present in Blam Honey’s music, and "CHANGING SPOUT IN MY HEAD" has elements of electro-noise and electro-industrial as well as quieter more melodic parts.

After a break for a few instrumentals, TATSUYA returns on "Neluhus Vagus", which is quite possibly the best track on this mini-album. Mixing together a variety of synths, ranging from opera voices to bagpipes and organs to machine sounding beats, with voice samples and TATSUYA’s singing/speaking, "Neluhus Vagus" is an absolutely amazing track.

Giving the CD a burst of energy (and snapping you out of the trance you got into whilst listening to "solve"), "GIVE IT TO ME" is slightly harsher than the others and is a great electro-industrial noise track. Strangely enough, the vocals on this song are perhaps the most melodic of all the tracks and it makes for a nice combination.

What makes "Typical Ingeniousness ~suggest~" so good is that Blam Honey have managed to get the balance between RYONAI’s melodies and noise synths perfect and mixed it excellently with TATSUYA’s unusual voice to create not only fantastic music, but music which also stirs the imagination of the listener as well. Definitely worth listening to if you like electronic music, and even if you don’t it’s worth listening to just for something a bit different from the norm.

Track Listing

1. oppresive paralysis
2. CHANGING SPOUT IN MY HEAD
3. myasthenia
4. SUSPECT
5. electroence phalogram
6. NELUHUS VAGUS
7. solve
8. GIVE IT TO ME
9. sequela

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