Over 30 years into their career,
Einstuerzende Neubauten
re-release their languid, slow-clanking 2000 effort
Silence Is Sexy
, an album that replaced some of the group's rage and storm with more traditional song structures like choruses and melody. The opening title track certainly isn't the group's finest offering, with
Blixa Bargeld
's constant repetition of the song's title making for a good argument that silence would have been a better option than what amounts to a new musical path but ultimately a rather lazy track. The songs closes with then increasingly common practice of inserting live audience audio chanting of the chorus -- an effect that doesn't add any additional drama. It's just another reason to choose silence or skip ahead.
Neubauten
do get into a compelling stomp on "Zampano," with
Bargeld
's quick German vocals making a nice counterpoint to a dance beat and the band's signature experimental, percussive clatter. And "Redukt" is a winner for sure, especially as
channels his cohort
Nick Cave
with passionate staccato screams that stir a boiling emotional pot. "Beauty" suffers from the same dullness as "Silence Is Sexy,"
's dissertation on the subject of beauty coming across as little more than a banal modern art installation score without the visuals to back it up.
seemed sort of revolutionary at the time, as the past noise merchants turned to structure, but history has shown it to be somewhat of a mixed and rather stale bag. What once felt experimental and cool often feels repetitive, formulaic, and dated too often to recommend the reissue to any but the most die-hard fans. ~ Tim DiGravina