Codename: Dustsucker

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Codename: Dustsucker album cover
Album Information
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Total Tracks: 9   Total Length: 49:58

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Nitsuh Abebe

eMusic Contributor

04.22.11
Bark Psychosis, Codename: Dustsucker
2005 | Label: Fire Records / The Orchard

Besides Disco Inferno, the other prime band of first-wave post-rock was Bark Psychosis — a crew of teenaged metalheads who matured into a much more elegant experimentalism. By the time they released their landmark 1993 album, Hex, they were making the kind of avant-garde your grandparents could love: the dubbed-out bass may have had a certain stoned torpor, and the slow-motion drifts of guitar chime, piano reverberation and string hum came together with the loose, open flow of a psychedelic act, but the feel was absolutely graceful, full of warm, pastoral glow and rich, sleepy depths. When the act re-emerged with this 2004 record, they'd only taken those impulses further along. The slow-burning float of its "pop" songs is as lulling and accessible as ever, and just as natural in its bucolic, open-air sound.

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Nope

Kevbo63

After Hex, these guys never rose to their grandeur again. Get Hex, one of my all-time favorites!

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Wonderful haunting dreamscapes

patrickjd2000

Listening to this album I'm reminded of strange, impressionable dreams I had as a child. At the same time one song brings to mind Al Stewarts song "Year of the cat"! However, it's because of these contrasts that this is a fascinating album that you will not get tired of hearing for a long,long time.

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Hits the spot and resonates...

Moody834

Quality music has certain defining characteristics: solid talent, expertise, well-directed creativity, staying power. Bark Psychosis has the right qualities. I can't seem to stop listening to this album. The band's sound falls somewhere between Porcupine Tree and mid to late period Talk Talk, but rest assured--Codename: Dustsucker is its own beast. The tracks are varied but the sound is consistent throughout. The lyrics drift through the melodies and rhythms on clear, strong wings; never overwhelmed or overwhelming. The tracks could stand alone (there's a lot of wonderful instrumentation here), but the singers perfectly round out the tunes in a complementary way that speaks volumes to the band's compositional skills. Highly recommended.

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This sure ain't Napalm Death

aikicinema

Talk about range. This is a shimmering and tuneful album from a band that started out life as a speed metal cover band. But I guess time does strange things to everyone. I don't know who to compare this sound to since I really haven't heard much that is comparable. At times I'm reminded of Brian Eno, at times The Church, and at other times a jazzy version of Psychic TV. But it isn't any of those really. Every track has superb arrangements and contains a surprising assortment of instruments and sounds. Incredible album.

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best kept secret

Goldfish

Age and experience seems to fade many an exciting band's star. Not these guys; the how-ever-many-years gap has only improved them. After "Hex" Sutton vanished only to surface again on the drum and bass scene, a move which was as bizarre as it was telling of the secret at the heart of this band: they never stood still musically, not in the david bowie "I heard this new band now I'm gonna ape them" style nor are they a bunch of crazy improvs - they're plugged into some deeper thing that takes jazz, pop, indie, electronics and carves something seemlessly beautiful. If anything the inclusion of a sometime female vocalist this time is the cherry on the cake, where Sutton can get a little too mopey for his own good, her whimsical pop vocal clashes with the darker undercurrents perfectly.

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