(((O))) : Bruise Blood – You Run Through The World Like An Open Razor

A taxidermy parrot looks out from the cover of You Run Through The World Like An Open Razor fixing us with an oblique stare. What does it want? What does it know? Bruise Blood is a new solo project from Mike Bourne who has previously released music under his own name, as part of Hirvikolari and, most notably, as one third of Teeth Of The Sea. This is a pleasantly enigmatic set of loose electronic tunes, more so the longer you spend with it. Things that seem straightforward at first drift away from your expectations.

Although its origin is unknown apparently this stuffed parrot featured in young Mike Bourne’s family home, later spending time in a museum where it gained a reputation for being cursed. Latterly returned to Mike it watched over the recording of this music. What if any contribution has it made here to merit the role of cover star? Are there parrot tunes? Does it not have a name? None of this is clear, it may not even be true, but something about the parrot’s unknowable gaze does chime with the music which is also attractive and mysterious.

A driving synth pulse opens ‘The Pressure’, joined by a submerged distorted vocal, the sound of revving engines and percussion that accents the pulse rather than drives the track. Various permutations of these features follow, I wouldn’t really describe this as a synth record or as techno but it wanders its own path between them, the main thrust of things coming from the layers of instrumental textures while the beats are often static even when hefty and the occasional vocals seem almost incidental.

‘The Pressure’ fades away to ‘Cede’ which has a deep bass motor beneath beats covered in crackle and hiss and some awesome sharp edged electro blurt. It ends abruptly but not as suddenly as ‘You’re in Control’ the album’s most dancefloor friendly tune. Topped off with wriggling acid lines and a calm repetition of the title, the hypnotic metronome of steady doof sticks to its pattern, it’s the pulse swelling against it that really gives it propulsion. ‘Until the Sun Breaks Down’ is a magical centre piece, softly melodic, the implacable tick of its beat is buried by a wave of distortion that arrives at its midpoint. There’s no hefty bass or beats instead it builds a levitating limitless moment from a fat mid range of textures.

The thing with Teeth of the Sea is their music has become so very wide ranging it’s difficult to say that any of this is something they wouldn’t do, while at the same time it does feel indefinably different. You can occasionally imagine the other two joining in and everything expanding and accelerating. Towards the end of ‘The Pressure’ there’s even some kind of wild distorted brass solo. Possibly parrot sax? Keeping things orthodontic I think it reminds me more of Gum Takes Tooth, particularly on ‘Oh But You Can, Oh But You Will’ and the claustrophobic night march of the title track.  

Then again, parrots don’t even have teeth. I like to think the cursed parrot is the narrator of the uncertain dark tale unwinding beneath the surface of ‘And They Burned A Hole Through The Earth All The Way To Hell’. The album’s approach to the beat really comes into its own on the lengthy final track ‘Glass Nine’. Again there are pools and patterns of circling synth parts before a weighty, awkward, rhythm strikes up. It sounds like a giant staple gun, may even be a treated sample of one. It does not accelerate or deviate, it does not gain intensity through repetition, doesn’t rise or drop, it just IS and then it stops. It sort of refuses to become an electro banger and the electric patterns hover on for the long fade out. The parrot keeps its own counsel.