(((O))) : Tobacco – Sweatbox Dynasty

By: Evan Sherman

It has taken many listens to finally gain traction of my thoughts on this new offering from Tobacco. First, I have enjoyed Tobacco for a very long time. Thomas Fec has soundtracked great highs and lows in my life and I have decided that he not only deserves the benefit of doubt, but he deserves the time and patience that is so frequently discarded for the next record making it’s way down the pike.

Sweatbox Dynasty starts with “Human Om,” a song as strong as any in his catalog. “Hong,” and “Wipeth Out,” bridge the gap between the two immediate hits on the album. “Gods in Heat,” is the second single and another great example of what makes Tobacco one of the greatest electronic artists today. Warbly and half-drunken synths layer around a sickened drum beat and wretched vocals that sound as if artificial intelligence had somehow progressed into original thought but decidedly sings of only the most disturbing and heinous things it can think up. My original problem was that the album seemed to be filled with a lot of filler songs, upon further investigation of these “filler” songs I started to locate memorable aspects present in songs that subtly float by without the bombastic thunder characteristic of Tobacco’s power. The high floating synth sprinkling a melody on “Hong.” The synths in “Home Invasionaries,” “Warlock Mary,” and “Suck Vipers,” are all more subdued than previous albums, but nonetheless intriguing and memorable.

“The Madonna,” displays a little more heavily a new aspect to this album’s sound, the cutting off of melodies and beats in distinctively odd and rough-sounding ways. “Fantasy Trash Wave,” brings the album back to former track glory with it’s consistent, yet stumbled, beat and beautiful synth melody that doubles down on itself when it comes to the chorus, crafting counterpoints along the way. “Memory Girl,” brings back the unfamiliar synth tones of previous songs. Synth tones that are hard to describe as unfamiliar or different considering you never know exactly what sound you are going to hear within this world. It is certainly still rooted in the 80’s, but it seems to be rooted in a different area of 80’s culture, I cannot pin it down but there is something different going on. Or, it’s just that these baser tones are now being revealed after stripping away the vacuum washed synths that usually float above the mix.

Now, we move on to the closing piece, a six-minute experimentation in cut beat and melody, “Let’s Get Worn Away.” A fitting title for a track that presents multiple different synth melodies and beats and splices them into one another, mashing unresolved song ideas into other song ideas, like the switching back and forth of radio stations. It is reminiscent of Odd Nosdam’s album, Plan 9… Meet Your Hypnotist. It can be a little jarring and frustrating at times, especially when he lands on a beat and melody that are particularly entrancing and then he cuts it off, unfinished.

The song ends with one minute of static white noise and I am eventually left wondering the reason for this style of delivery. Did his decision to return to his former approach of distorting sound with manual tape manipulation hinder his ability to create lush songs filled with strange and unusually sounds or did he mean to convey the difficulty that goes into the art of creating music in such a way? Do we as listeners take for granted the ease with which music is now created and digested in a high-tech, fast-paced world? Is the fact that this music can be difficult at times force us to take a closer look at, and give more consideration to, the music itself and why it was created the way it was? Have I answered my own question just by asking these questions? Maybe, but that is neither here, nor all the way over there. Sweatbox Dynasty has songs that are great, memorable, classic Tobacco songs; it also has songs that can be difficult to unravel. It is an interesting and thought-provoking album.