I wanted to do a noise/glitch-hop review so I could further delve into what my thresholds were for random sounds arranged into melodies, because I can bear some of it. Look at artists like Death Grips and edIT, who have enjoyed great commercial success for their use of harsh noise and "glitch-hop." These are two artists who have helped bring this sound into the mainstream, almost entry-level musicians of the genre, if you will. I decided to delve a little bit deeper and found a lesser known glitch/noise-hop group called Food For Animals, who provide a Death Grips sound sans a lot of the screamed rapping. Rather, Food For Animals' Belly employs a heavier, less poppy glitch sound than DG while rapping bars that you can actually make out. It's actually a lot less accessible than other artists of the kind, staying more true to it's genre than groups with more commercial success. There is a lot of harsh noise and static in the background set to the word salad FFA lays down, and just the sheer nature of the music makes it a bit iffy for conventional listening. The track "Belly Kids" provides a good example of what real, thick glitch-hop can amount to. "Belly Kids" may as well have been a hardcore cover of a Death Grips track, with one of the nastiest sounding instrumentals ever suddenly giving way to the psychedelic, ominous sounding whispers of FFA set to random samples. What keeps Food For Animal from falling into noisy dreck is the fact it's still a hip-hop album, and through and through they are considered indie hip-hop, subcategorized into grime/noise/glitch music due to their instrumentals, sort of in the same vein as an artist like El-P. The rapping on this album is actually pretty solid and helps complement and account for some of the aesthetic flaws of the glitch instrumentals.
"Grapes" in particular helps highlight the rapping skills of the group while also reminding you why you're here: for a glitch orgy. "Grapes" incorporates and somehow reconciles a hip-hop sound akin to golden age 90s rap with hardcore club glitch sounds. It is actually a worthy track of representing exactly what is being attempted here. Unlike Death Grips who focuses on being noisy as possible on all fronts, or edIT who attempts to make the glitch melodic through expert turntablism, FFA insteads works on refining their hip-hop sound while letting the glitch freely flow wherever the hell it wants (check out "Yo" for some choice aural abuse.) It's a formula that sometimes work, sometimes doesn't. I ca continue to draw parallels between this group and El-P, a rapper/producer who raps intensively over dark industrial beats. Food For Animals is a way less refined, and more dirty and earthy answer to El-P. The difference is Food For Animals often delves into pure noise music and sometimes that is where they are at their weakest. I'm not saying "Virgogo" is an example of this, because I can only accurately define it as some sort of noise-hop dance instrumental and trying to give a qualitative ranking with nothing to truly compare it to would be stupid. Yet I will say that tracks like it are where I'm not really a huge fan of them. If you want to do noise/glitch-hop instrumentals you should at least try to make them sound less discordant. Belly stands out as a noise-hop/rap album but not so much glitch-hop album. In that field it's rather annoying.
Belly still provides a promising look at a perhaps promising group. Though Death Grips will always steal the stage in regards to the genre, I do find their sound somewhat better. There are just points where I could not bring myself to enjoy the album, much in the same way I could not appreciate the experimental madness of Takemura's Hoshi No Koe. "Maryland Slang" simply made me cringe, I find the crescendo into the glitch explosion absolutely terrible. I know Ricky Rabbit, the guys behind the beats of the album, is capable of a lot more with stuff like "Tween My Lips" and "Tween Fantasy," in which the glitch and electronic beats are enticing, melodic and actually listenable and the rap is solid. The rap itself is strong flow-wise and I have no qualms with any of the stylistic decisions of the MC, even when he crosses into raucous Death Grips territory with stuff like "Mutumbo." Their sound is unrefined but there is something good there, and I do know they had apparently tightened up their sound from 4 year before this album (according to Pitchfork, which I will take to be the truth, because I kind of fear what I might find if I tried to look up FFA circa 2004. I don't agree with the 8.1 rating, however.) Perhaps we will see something new from them that will take them in a better direction. Perhaps Food For Animals will break into the underground territory ruled upon by artists like El Producto.
Overall, the album is definitely not the best thing I've heard in awhile. There is a sort of disproportionate amount of noise to the actual good stuff. The raps are word salad and that is perfectly fine with me. I never faulted Aesop for not knowing what the hell he meant. The beats are sort of crazed and unpleasant but there is a semblance of something really cool somewhere in there. I wouldn't reccomend to this anyone solely around for hip-hop, because much of the unpalatable sound overpowers the rapping so completely all you can think about is when the track will end or at least get better. It's psychedelic enough if you're looking for something like that, but it's a far cry different from anything hip-hop styled that Tobacco did. I will mention that while it's worth a shot some of the stuff on here is on the actual harsh side and you should be prepared for that. Watch out for "Maryland Slang," "Yo," and "Bubbleguts/Territory/My Breath" in particular if you cannot swallow noise music.
I hope you enjoyed my review on Death Grips: Exmilitary!
I'll give this album a 5.5/10, was hovering on a 6/10 because of the pretty solid hip-hop work but there are other elements that forced it down a bit. Listen with caution.
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