Dead Cross, the hardcore / thrash supergroup that crushed craniums with their eponymous debut in 2017, are finally back. Comprising Michael Crain (Retox), Justin Pearson (The Locust), Dave Lombardo (ex-Slayer, Mr Bungle) and Mike Patton (if you don’t know by now…), on their debut, the band kept a tight focus on the direct, visceral assault of hardcore, with influences from acts such as The Accused, Deep Wound and Siege shot through their savage assault. In contrast, II offers a more varied assault on the senses, as reminiscent of The Dillinger Escape Plan as it is of The Dead Kennedys. Thus, while still managing to be blisteringly concise (it features just nine songs, two of which don’t even hit the three-minute mark), it is a record of impressive contrast, elevated (as ever) by Patton’s remarkable vocals.
Opening the album, the horrifically distorted bass of Love Without Love provides a surprisingly atmospheric curtain raiser. A track of fierce cross currents, it sees Mike Patton whispering in the listener’s ear with an eerie intensity one minute, only to explode into barely coherent screams the next. The band are equally versatile, redefining what is understood by the term “heavy” as they infuse jazz and no wave into their feral assault. While next track Animal Espionage is, in one sense, more direct, it remains a dizzyingly arty song, packed with unconventional riffing and driven by Dave Lombardo’s increasingly diverse percussion. Wreathed in reverb, the band even digress into early Pink Floyd territory, as a psychedelic riff descends, only to be swept away on a tidal wave of punk. Something of a throwback to the debut, Heart Reformer is a deranged hardcore number, filtered through the band’s unique perception. With its dark and deeply uncomfortable video, it’s hardly surprising that it was chosen as a single, but even here, the notion of conventionality is relative, and the music takes the listener on all sorts of twists and turns. Taking a sideways step, the stabbing Strong And Wrong allows the riffs to breathe, although Dave’s full-on performance behind the kit maintains the intensity, before the first side ends with Ants And Dragons, another track that sees Justin Pearson’s bowel-rupturing bass take the lead. With hints of early Sepultura and Mr Bungle shot through its dynamic, pulsing riffs, it is another example of just how intensely innovative Dead Cross can be when the mood takes them.
Opening side two, Nightclub Canary wastes little time in performing an aural trepanning on the listener, the scything riffs as brutal as anything found on the band’s splenetic debut. Next up, and providing a moment’s respite, Christian Missile Crisis is a comparatively simplistic, heads-down hardcore track destined to turbo charge the pit at live shows. While the music of Reign Of Error is no less blistering, the vocals provide light and shade, seemingly in spite of the track’s brevity. It leaves Imposter Syndrome to bring the album to a close on an introspective note, Patton’s playground chant of “I see you, but I wouldn’t want to be you”, backed by eerie riffs and tribal percussion. The speed ramps up as the track approaches its end, and the album ends on a suitably schizophrenic note that leaves the listener with a fair idea of what concussion feels like.
Like any Mike Patton project, descriptions are misleading. Whether the stated goal is pop, jazz, punk or metal, it’s always filtered through the collective consciousness of Patton and his merry cohorts, and the results are always skewed outside of a common frame of reference. As such, while tracks like Heart Reformer and Christian Missile Crisis cleave closely to the established hardcore sound, the influence across the album is more the spirit than the style. It is this that makes Dead Cross so utterly exhilarating, and there’s a sense, listening here, of the excitement that band felt when they first encountered hardcore as teenagers. Throughout, it’s clear the band are never playing for anything other than the love of it, which is all you can ask from any artist. Intense, innovative and a whole heap of fun, II is a more than welcome return form Dead Cross. 9.5.10
