Hurtbreak Wonderland – World’s End Girlfriend (2007)
GENRES – Experimental, Electronic, Ambient, Post Rock
Wandering – 1:49
Birthday Resistance – 5:23
100 Years of Choke – 13:22
Grass Ark – 10:14
Ghost Of A Horse Under The Chandelier – 7:56
The Octuple Personality And Eleven Crows – 10:32
Breath Or Castle Ballad – 3:15
Bless Yourself Bleed – 10:32
Dance For Borderline Miscanthus – 4:39
River Was Filled With Stories – 10:13
I remember buying this album the first day it was available online after experiencing ‘Dream’s End Come True’ (2002) and just KNOWING it would be one that stuck with me. Sure enough, it is probably in my top 3-4 albums that have been released in the last few years. Its just special and different over the course of the album, something new to me, and underrated in the WEG discography. This album is definitely worth a 100 MB download, if not your hard earned dosh. WEG’s name behind the scenes is Katsuhiko Maeda.
Wandering as a slow introduction to the album, just a sample of what is to come. The sounds of babies crying and someone waking up and leaving in the morning signal the ‘beginning’ of some absolute quality. The piece is simple, but is meant to be listened in conjunction with ‘Birthday Resistance’, which carries over the ensemble of violinists and brass instrumentalists. Maeda comes out to shine with his mixing and production of the piece. Random spikes, glitches and alterations riddle the ensembles, as he mixes and matches sounds and samples. The electronic beats truly are a beaut, especially in conjunction with the post rock elements. Compared to his other albums, HW is quite accessible, and this isn’t a bad thing.
The true gold begins with ‘100 Years Of Choke’. It begins with calming sounds of nature, before Maeda introduces his classical composition to the piece. The light pluck of strings on the shamisen is quite a delight, before the string pieces enter the fray. Just alone this would make an amazing album, as layer upon layer is added, more string pieces, drums, cymbals, and guitars become prominent. It’s a beautifully relaxing start. As the central violin takes stage, the electronic mixing becomes more prominent; however it is yet to disturb this peace. As the pieces reach their end on the composition, it almost becomes lonely, yet maintains its beauty. As more instruments are substituted for others, such as guitars and flutes, it never loses its exquisiteness or calming influence. The classical composition part reaches its apex at ~7 minutes, and it makes you wish you were simply outside, in nature on a sunny day with birds chirping, before the bombastic electronics enter the mix at around 8-9 minutes. The change in pace particularly doesn’t discount from the song. Instead it adds another layer of depth, as electronics and electrical guitar become the basis. It still evokes a feeling of beauty, yet one much harder to attain. The song quietens down for a moment, with only vocal samples and distortion, before it explodes once again in a blaze of glory. It’s hard to explain what goes on from there. It must be experienced, as instruments are found here and there, but never consistently easy to identify over the chaotic electronics.
‘Grass Ark’, however, is the true standout of the album. The song is an amalgamation of cutting, mixing and beautiful sampling, done to the point of perfection in my opinion. The piece begins similarly in construct to ‘100 Years’, however, Maeda’s role is much more prominent much earlier, as random sounds and samples are cut over the piano and strings. The variation and chaos this brings to naturals sounds is amazing. The composition of the piece is amazing, as nature and machine collide. The quality of performance from the instrumentalists must also be noted. Though not the most terribly difficult composition, it is done extremely well. The piece slows down at about the 5 minute mark, only to introduce some maniacal laugh and sounds, which are great… It is a piece that MUST be experienced… I know I may use that term a lot, but its hard enough to describe such an artists work without being able to reference specific parts. Perhaps because the electronic elements are less ‘interfering’ than they are in ‘100 years’ but this is the standout song from the album. It just flows naturally and delightfully.
‘Ghost Of A Horse Under The Chandelier’ is almost a childish to begin with, reminding me of young children who simply hit random keys to try and make something sound good without wondering about depth. The song is built around these sharp notes and short constructs. The song as a whole, however, loses itself a bit along the way. There are parts that simply seem unnecessary, despite how good they sound at times. ‘The Octuple Personality And Eleven Crows’ is a more classical construct, reminiscent of home and family (feet running past, small touches like that) and has some of the nicest electronic beats and distortion on the album, and Maeda isn’t afraid to drag those beats over key parts of the song. The saxophone performance is quite a nice quality coming out of nowhere after a distortion. The flute is the same deal, coming into fruition after a glitch. Parts of the song later of seem a bit odd, and don’t really fit in well, but I guess that’s what WEG is trying to achieve. The song truly experiences the most cacophonic sounds from the album, though it does feel too long and dragged out.
‘Breath or Castle Ballad’ is a nice intermission from the overly eclectic, and at just over 3 minutes offers a nice change in time needed to devote yourself to the song. ‘Bless Yourself Bleed’ is an interesting piece in that a fairly important factor of the piece is vocal sampling. The piece is haunting, especially the repeating words of some female voice, who is prominent enough to be heard, but overshadowed by other instruments in the way. This is before its all stripped away to a single instrument, a piano, which sounds like those old music boxes, that start playing when you open the top. This enhanced the chilling feeling, simply because those types of music boxes are always adjoined to horror parts in movies and games. The song is probably his most interesting on the album. It has solid depth that requires attention, and the electronics glitches are used to brilliantly halfway through the song. It flows extremely well, which was required after the last few songs which can get lost at times.
‘Dance For Borderline Miscanthus’ sets a more solemn tone with a deep string ensemble and ‘scrounging’ sounds in the background… The electronics used are darker compared to the light and high pitch ones found elsewhere on the album. Maeda uses cuts to interrupt the album, never allowing the listener to get comfortable with the song, and is intermittent with laughing samples and other noises. The most aggressive piece on the album, it works well in the 4 minutes its given.
‘River Was Filled With Stories’ is a nice send off to the album, and feels like a real ending song, rather than just another song, which is all that’s really needed to cap a stellar album.
Whilst it may not be for everyone, it is a great change of pace for both worlds. I personally loved the simple classical composition, as well as the jazzy factors present throughout various parts of the album, and Maeda has a very good ‘knack’ at mixing and knowing when to change his electronic beats. The album isn’t always perfect. Some parts drag on, and some parts are simply unnecessary, but there is enough quality in enough of the songs to give a high score. On the personal level, I simply love it, and it was quite a difficult album to review, simply because its hard to describe.
TOTAL SCORE
8.0/10
– Bless Yourself Bleed
– Grass Ark
PS I’ll try to move out of electronics as a sub genre with the next batch
