Rolo Tomassi - Hysterics (Hassle)
3/5
By: Richard Brant
A wise soul once said that one must leave their comfort zone and explore realms unfamiliar, in order to truly understand ones self. Well, I must certainly know my arse from my elbow now...
Hysterics, Rolo Tomassi's debut is one of the most bizarre yet intriguing albums I have heard all year. Not quite prepared for the ear mauling about to be received the album did not sit too well with me at first, but after a number of listens the intricacies formally unnoticed began to be revealed. Many tracks are symphony like, full of movements exposing different musical styles from hardcore to abstract jazz/funk to thrash to "what-the-fuck-core?" All of this topped with the quite harrowing vocals of lead singer Eva Spence it's hard to believe that this five piece are so young.
The eerie electronics of 'Oh, Hello Ghost' opens the album as a calm before the storm, one might say. A minute in, the pure vocals of Eva Spence enter shortly followed by an intermittent base and thumping drum. Brother Jaime Spence then retorts with the male vocals before an electronic curtain raiser reveals a clanging cascade of guitar. This finally ends with the base taking a change in pace and the full force of pipe sized Eva Spence's voice becoming quite clear as she screams through a crashing cycle of hardcore riffs to end.
'I Love Turbulence' attacks getting the proverbial head bouncing before a wavering solitary keyboard dupes you in to a false sense of security allowing venomous vocals and a maniacal guitar to splice in. Suddenly Spence bursts in to this unfaltering angelic voice (a Jekyll and Hyde trait seen throughout the album) backed with a rolling base line. Next movement we have a chiming keyboard with speeding drums before a wave of hardcore washes you to the end of the song.
Its this kind of almost random movement within tracks with many differing elements that could make this article as long as Roman Abramovich's bank statement, which I think neither of us wants, so hear are the highlights.
Amongst 'Fofteen's' wild keyboard, growling jazz composition there is this amazing calm lounge style guitar jazz recital before it moves in to the more heavy style power chord you would have believed more apt. "Abraxas" supplies even more of this abstract jazz style with drum and guitar interaction until the keyboard takes centre stage with a hook of a solo accompanied with a fantastic slow drum beat eventually flanked by powerful guitar stabs to the end.
Elsewhere, 'Apology to the Universe' is a slow aside where it's almost like Rolo Tomassi feel guilty for making too much noise. A number of synth chords build to a point where they decide "sod this" and hit you with the next track 'Nine' almost burning your face off. This is another track full of movements. Listen out for the organ style filtering effect before the quite beautifully calm ending with old style piano.
For the sake of completion, 'Macabre Charade' has a dark calm start ending in some wonderful abstract craziness which 'Trojan Measures' pertinently carries on for another minute. 'Everything Went Grey' is another calm aside with strange dark sounds infected with all manner of bleeps and distortion leading in to the quite lethal but likeable 'Scars.' Finally the epic fourteen minutes twenty that is 'Fantasia', with its five movements, proves an ample ground to showcase a number of musical styles and abilities these young artists possess.
This is not an album you could easily listen to every day... It's quite frankly mental, but this is the same reason it has endeared itself to me. These youngsters are ahead of their years in musical vision and ability and it will be interesting to see how they move on from here.
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