30.12.07

Severed Heads - Dead Eyes Opened


Cela fait de nombreuses années que Severed Heads ne nous envoie plus rien de son (pourtant très créatif) hémisphère austral. Les "têtes divisées" le sont probablement à jamais, même si un site semble continuer d'assurer le service de vente à distance.
Tom Ellard et son groupe avait développé un style très personnel, à coups de bandes magnétiques et de ciseaux, de sonorités loufoques, de boucles traitées, de synthés sautillants, de percussions centrifugées avec des voix et des bruitages machiniques. Tel que je le décris, là, ça a peut-être l'air d'une soupe triturée au mixer, mais non : Severed Heads, c'est un monde musical original et entièrement cohérent, qui ne ressemblait à rien de connu - et bien que ce groupe ait été apparenté à la vague électro-indus, il s'en démarquait largement par sa créativité et son humour. Il suffit d'écouter ses mélodies envoûtantes, chantonnées d'une voix douce, en décalage avec les voix sombres de rigueur en pleine période industrielle. Un maxi regroupant plusieurs titres d'inspirations différentes est audible chez Pop Will Eat My Blog

Although largely overlooked, Severed Heads were one of the better groups to grace the Nettwerk Records label during the 80's and 90's. The sad thing is that the group was putting out excellent material, but always overshadowed by label mates Skinny Puppy. Though there are some instances where Severed Heads do moniker the industrial sound that was abundant in this label, I always felt they were a chameleon of musical genres. You'll probably get a sense of what I mean when you listen to this EP, in that the musical styles change somewhat from track to track. Parts of this EP sound like industrial-ish rantings, while other parts fit nicely on a compilations alongside OMD or Soft Cell. Even the track 'We Have Come To Bless This House' sounds like it was an OMD b-side from one of the earlier albums. But overall, I love this EP for the track 'Dead Eyes Opened', which I think is a great synthpop track, and perfectly exemplifies what the sound should be like. Love them or hate them, Severed Heads were premiere stuff, and if you rifle through the small bad bits, you'll find some gorgeous music hidden away. Quotation and link from pwemb.blogspot.com (Pop Will Eat My Blog)

2 commentaires:

litlgrey a dit…

I never cared that Severed Heads eventually started coming out on Nettwerk. By that time, their work that was the most fun had already been released - first on cassette and then on record - in the artist's native Australia. I always got the import EPs and LPs in New York City, for like nine bucks each or less.

Ellard had other bad luck issues too, like the time he toured North America in support of Chris and Cosey, and all his gear got ripped off. Just utter crap.

The significant difference with Severed Heads was, on good days, they were funny. I can't remember all that many tracks, but I am reminded of one I liked called "Brassiere, In Rome" which turned the then-prevalent voice sample on its ear by more or less sticking to a tape loop style rather than... oh let's say "God Loves the Rock Stars" by Hunting Lodge... something like that.

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