Low - 'Drums And Guns' (Sub Pop) Released 02/04/07

Gone is the wide-screen panoramic 'subtlety' that we've come to know of Minnesota's Low, on 'Drums And Guns' their 8th album their tone is a whole lot darker with hermetically-sealed arrangements and oppressive scraping guitars being looped with drum machine angst, the ruminations on murder and death covering 13 short tracks. Like an album from the Warp records camp, producer Dave Fridmann has invested 'Drums And Guns' with an experimental leftfield art-school stamp for post-traumatic shock that seethes more than it moves.

'Pretty People' starts as it continues with the low frequency / white noise dirge of guitars with the home-truth ruminations delivered with a wailing vocal - "...all the little babies/ they're all gonna die...all you pretty people/ you're all gonna die..." and just adds up to an early-Velvets death-trip. 'Belarus' and 'Always Fade' take in lighter programming, the former with ping-pong, the latter with klunky beats and an atmospheric wash with a beheading theme - "...cut freely the weight on your neck...", whilst 'Breaker' is set to a droning organ and hand-claps with Neil Young-styled guitar licks that reminds of early-Eno. 'Dragonfly' explores the 60's legacy of the pills that changed the world with mechanised factory sonics and warped-guitar, and 'Sandininsta' pays homage to the CIA's favourite revolutionaries with a marching drummer boy beat and cymbal with a battle-worn song.

Songs come with 'Dust On The Window' and its dark swathes of guitar effects and biscuit tin beats lightened by female vocals - "this time tomorrow/ I'll be just one day closer/ one sunset further behind...", and 'Hatchet' is mere titillation with a  twanging bass - "...let's bury the hatchet/ like The Beatles and The Stones...you'll be my Marianne/ and I'll be your Yoko...", and 'Your Poison' is an all too brief meditation starting Capella then veers "..your tongue is a weapon...", whilst 'Your Time' has the leftfieldism of Boards Of Canada with a vocal din and minimal beats - "...take your time/ sweet thing..." possessing a certain epical quality. 'In Silence' addresses violence with a lo-fi droning number and railway-track beats, whilst 'Murderer' has a Gus Gus sound alike with bass-driven low frequencies and a look askance at our dark side - "...you may need a murderer/ someone to do your dirty work...".

Perhaps ambivalence with the subject matter has entertained the use of a programming which lends a detachment to subject matter, only the slowcore of Low's sonics come with varying degrees of klunkiness, the machinations of programming like a cold heartless industrialism producing a claustrophobic work and a discomforting listen.