You Can Be My Wave

After Jane Remover introduced their guitar driven, shoegaze side project, venturing, I thought this would signal a shift back to the sound that more closely resembles Frailty. In some respects this is true, but Revengeseekerz is severely lacking in any of the qualities that made Frailty such a fun and engaging album. The production for one is obnoxiously messy, one-dimensional, and fails at delivering anything in the way of colourful timbres or melodic hooks. On a technical standpoint, many of the tracks have an unnatural pulse -- either from hard stutter edits or aggressive side-chain compression -- that I find distracting or headache-inducing. The progression of these tracks are also some of Jane Remover's most stagnant and unadventurous. Frailty's highlights had some rather unexpected detours that melded the pop and noise elements together, and this album fails to recreate that same sense of excitement.

On the vocal end of things, I'm also very disappointed. While I recognize that Jane Remover comes across much more confident in their delivery compared to their timid, bedroom recordings in the past, the auto-crooned, rap deliveries are a net negative. The flows on this record are sloppy, melodically stiff, and frustratingly repetitive. From what I can catch from the lyrics, they come across as arrogant and confrontational, which doesn't hold very much weight when the music is this awful. I would also describe the verses as a stream of consciousness rambling packed full of appropriated language that sounds grossly out of character and gen z buzzwords.

The only track that I liked was Dark night castle, a futuristic ballad that features a cornucopia of repetitive motifs that range in musicality between gentle descending piano lines and the buzz of an alarm clock. Unlike other tracks, each element is fleeting and given it's own space; it's busy, not messy. I also enjoy the vocals on this track. I don't find them to be as monotonous, and despite the heavy tuning, Jane Remover's delivery comes across very genuine and emotive. This was really the only exception though as I really didn't get anything out of this record. I get the sense that this is just one of those 'vibe' records that puts more emphasis on the aesthetic than truly interesting songs. I like to think that I'm very receptive to these cutting edge strands of pop and electronic music, but Revengeseekerz honestly makes me feel like I'm severely out of touch.