MISSION OF BURMA: The Obliterati (Matador)
What's with all these old post-punk legends coming out of retirement and laying down the most intense and cathartic music of their careers? First Wire, then Killing Joke and Gang of Four, and now Mission of Burma have risen from the grave and unleashed some truly gut-punching Noise Rock on an unsuspecting world.
I was in a bit of quandary trying to decide which Wire album to focus on for this blog. This is a band that's been around practically forever and has made quite a lot of quality music all along the way.
Once upon a time, the Simple Minds were not the dreary U2 wannabes they became. Before they broke everyone's hearts, they were one of the most exciting and innovative postpunk acts in the world. Before they chased around the almighty pound/dollar/deutschmark (nearly as fervently as they hungered after Bono's dingleberries), the Simple Minds were a neo-Teutonic, proto-Industrial leviathan powered primarily by Derek Forbes' monstrous post-funk bass.
Genius is a curse, not only because it shares a driveway with madness but also because it often falls prey to that most insidious of demons: boredom. This is an occupational hazard particularly for musical geniuses.
I've been trying to wrap my head around the events of the past two weeks, on account it seems like somebody might have opened a Gate or broken a Seal somewhere. I'm still waiting for some fresh shoes to drop so please bear with me while the apocalyptic cake bakes. But then again, you don't probably need to tell you just how weird everything seems to have gotten out there, as if the Watchers may have come back from vacation and wanted to hit the ground running.