Songs for Insects

By 1992, thrash was on its last legs. At the time I rather doubt anyone could've forecast just how massive the drop-off would be by 1994, but the whole genre was already giving off hearty whiffs of post-expiry date mould. Kalamazoo's Thought Industry emerged very, very late for dinner, but even one listen to their debut LP Songs for Insects demonstrates that they were a band hell-bent on beating the best-before date. Far from the one-size fits all mentality of the thrash pioneers, Thought Industry are the kind of customers who try on all the hats in the haberdashery and wind up leaving the store wearing a live hedgehog. That doesn't make any sense, but it approximates sense, which is as good a description of Thought Industry's music as any. Learn to accept the variety, and try to avoid the prickles.

Songs for Insects tips the scales at sixty-four minutes, which puts it in the same weight class as some of thrash's most bloated terrors (I'm looking at you, Time Does Not Heal), but virtually everything is approached with an irresistible giddy-up attitude that the minutes tend to whiz by, just like the fragmentary ideas you'll find yourself attempting to grasp from the air. It's a bit like Mike Patton played at Flotsam & Jetsam tempos with Spiral Architect's chops, except when it's being the thrash reincarnation of '70s Genesis on the title track, or a groove metal Godflesh on "Corner Stone" or some sort of beautiful alien new age prog acoustic on "Blistered Text and Bleeding Pens". And other huge sections tracks where it's not at all like how I've attempted to describe it. I guess it'd be easiest to just say that these guys share the kind of 'anything goes' ethos of avant-garde art metal weirdos like Patton or maudlin of the Well and leave it at that.

For all its admirable ingenuity though, Songs for Insects is clearly the work of an inexperienced band who haven't yet realized that, like any spice, too much variety can result in an unpalatable experience. The battle-hardened surrealist may not bat an eye at the transition between the gorgeous classical acoustic guitar of "Alexander vs. The Puzzle" and the coo-coo clock thrasher "Ballerina", but most of us mere mortals will need a season in the sky to wrap our feeble minds around such things. Other tracks simply succumb to compositional excesses, such as the fairly traditional speed metal epic "The Challice Vermillion" [sic], which hums along pretty well for five minutes (with some awesome drumming to boot) then completely wallowing in the worst kind of wankery, before kind of getting its shit back together in the final minute and a half or so . And the less one attempts to decipher the extremely ambitious title track, which retains the inconstancy of classic Genesis whilst quadrupling the speed, the more likely to remain sane one will be.

In spite of such rookie mistakes, Thought Industry already shows signs of becoming one of the world's best bands (as they were from 1996-2002). Principal songwriter and singer Brent Oberlin overreaches himself vocally at times, and his lyrics are often a bit too oblique, but there are snatches of brilliance in both departments (“God exists, God is good, God is omnipotent/You can only have two of three”). Musically though he's already come into his own. He has so many fine ideas that they seem to be coming bursting forth from twixt his temples in uncontrolled gouts. Certainly the album's final three tracks, all extremely ornate acoustic-based and progged out the wazoo, demonstrate extremely remarkable compositional skill. In spite of being ostensibly fairly similar in structure, the way in which the band's jaw-dropping technical abilities are arranged is very distinct. It’s brilliant progressive rock that reminds you of the way the greats did it, sliced and diced in ways they never could’ve imagined.

Thought Industry would never sound like this again, and while each subsequent record is vastly superior to this initial effort, this is still a very rewarding listen. It's arty as hell, and almost painfully obvious that it's intended to be, but nothing about this really feels austere. It's easy to feel like you're right down in the studio with the boys, watching some very talented people trying to figure how to make music worthy of their skills. Not everything works, but a lot does. And if they hadn't made these mistakes early, they'd never have become so utterly wonderfully themselves.

Stand-Out Tracks: "The Flesh is Weak", "Blistered Text and Bleeding Pens", "Ballerina"

Additional Note: With all the insane time changes, impossible fretless bass figures and seemingly endless layers of Byzantine guitar riffing, you might fail to notice the virtual absence of actual solos on this thing. It's not hurt by their lack, but I thought it worth pointing out. This might be the most technical metal album I've ever heard without (prominent) solos. Just goes to show how far outside the usual metal headspace these guys actually were.