Review: Orchestra Of Constant Distress ‘Concerns’

If you’re a pre-existing fan of Sweden’s gloriously scummy Orchestra Of Constant Distress I will straight away offer you the TL;DR version of this review – yes, it’s more of the same, yes it’s still great. Trivial though it may seem, there are so few reliable things left in the current bizarro timeline the world has been thrown into that a new OOCD album, that sees them staunchly refuse to depart from their usual template of well-honed instrumental dirge rock, is strangely comforting.

Orchestra Of Constant Distress ‘Concerns’

Hell, the opening track is called Consistence, because OOCD are that uninterested in fucking about. They haven’t suddenly opted in a moment of madness to go for a more polished production or go prog. They’re still churning (and ‘churning’ is the most appropriate word here) the kind of ultra-primitivist take on maximum rock ‘n’ roll possible, think The Stooges via Chrome via several sessions of electro convulsive therapy, beamed at you live from the back room of a 70s New York adult bookstore.

Concerns sees the band engage even tighter into the locked groove they’ve already established and stare a little further into the heart of darkness. This album might be a little more nocturnal if anything, carrying the feel of walking through the bad part of town late at night. The one-two punch of Presence and Unreleased mid album is its’ peak. The filtered bass/tremolo feedback of the former, and shitfaced sway of the latter, evoke the slammed doors and flashing lights of being kicked out into the street by nightclub bouncers in a drunken stupor. The weird bit-crushed guitar notes at the end of Unreleased are like car horns honking at you as you fall into the path of traffic.

It’s the sound of drugs going badly wrong in an abandoned building…

The lo-fi production is key with OOCD. It seems to coat the instruments in a layer of dirt and has the effect of removing the human element. Everything seems cold and ominous, and in spite of the blown-out production, the actual music is controlled chaos. The rhythm section moves it all along serpentine style, the guitar waving a rusty kitchen knife in your face but never actually going in for the cut. You may feel the need to reach for the bleach or schedule a tetanus injection after listening. While much is made of OOCD‘s connection to the infamous Brainbombs, even without that band’s depraved lyrics I’d argue OOCD are the scarier band at this point. Their name has never seemed more fitting than it does listening to the clattering dirge of Difference or Attention‘s strangled two note clang.

This is an album that seems like it’s best enjoyed while pulling on your balaclava to rob a petrol station garage. It’s the sound of drugs going badly wrong in an abandoned building. It’s also weirdly sexy – the acidic groove of Exposure is incidental music for a lost Richard Kern smut short, or the weirdest peep show you’ve ever been to. It’s fundamentally wrong. And as usual from this mob, it’s fucking great.

Label: Riot Season
Band Links: Bandcamp

Scribed by: Jamie Grimes