Lego

While at the "Tribe" period there were no words to reflect the greatness and ingenuity of Italians' music, in the case of "Lego" there are also no words...but in a completely opposite sense - for a dramatic reduction of the general level. After a rather average reception of "Crust" (interestingly, in some groups it was considered brilliant - and this is absurd like premium products from Biedra [company of the cheapest shops in Poland]) and minor line-up changes (Oinos was replaced by Alessio Spallarossa), the Tommy Talamanca's band decided to go crazy with experiments, immersing themself in a completely different style. It took them for quite fashionable and sought-after sounds in the 00s.

Well, the band decided to go into...nu-metal with industrial influences (?), completely rejecting the earlier, progressive style! What was the purpose of such an absurd transformation, hard to guess (known as - $$$), but the problem is that...this style does not make me feel at the greatest bands from this trend! - so it's hard to find a rational approach. What's worse, with Sadist, the matter looks even more unfavorable if you look at the instrumentalists' technique and the general, earlier cds. Against the background of the brilliant "Above The Light" and "Tribe", such a turn in search of a "new face" appears like a punch right in the face for fans of twisted or related to previous longs prog-death metal playing. Well, with the content of "Lego", "Crust" seems to be quite decent and reasonably diverse material! In the case of this album, unfortunately, there is nothing to worth paying attention to - they are all very bad. Fabulous technique, neoclassical melodies, intriguing atmosphere, all these elements evaporated in favor of repetitive, shredded riffs, tired singing in the style of Jonathan Davis (with additional, pissing-off groans), a quasi-psychedelic atmosphere and kitschy keyboards similar to a Rammstein parody. And for dessert - the album lasts nearly 70 minutes.

However, the worst thing was that so many negative words must have fallen under one of my favorite prog-death bands. Well, the standards of the previous recordings and the departure of the Italians into nu-metal led the band to a drastic drop in quality, and as a result, that Sadist only a year later split-up. Fortunately, after the reactivation, similar incidents did not occur anymore.

Originally on: https://subiektywnymetal.blogspot.com/2021/11/sadist-lego-2000.html

I have to admit I was quite upset by this “lego puzzle” here the first time I heard it; after the claustrophobic, oppressive grandiosity of “Crust” our friends had to throw this ode to all children’s favourite pastime right after. Why…

experiments of the kind were much more common some 5/6 years earlier, but at the dawn of the new millennium, when the old school was slowly but surely waking up, such frivolities were generally frowned upon as they were siding with the caprices and the whims of a past decade. Sadist never felt tempted by the groovy/industrial/grunge vogues when the time was right for them… why did they decide to give them a go of some sorts when those were quickly fading from the social consciousness?

Well sadists they are, for crying out loud; they like torturing the hapless audience with their stylistic excesses be it with a lush overuse of keyboards (“Tribe”) or with cold depressing vistas (“Crust”). The thing is that in this case they have come close to losing their identity in their strife for moving away from their multi-layered progressive death metal surges. How tired they must have gotten of them became very clear seven years later when the self-titled opus brought them back in all their complex grandeur… but right now we have to deal with a recording that has very little to do with the Sadist repertoire as we all know it, before and after.

Several people, who hold this recording very highly in their polls, have advised, not really pleaded, me to spend more time with it as it had its indelible charm in spades; only if you could have the ears to sense it… well, my ears have very seldom misled me during all these years, and in this particular case they tell me to just be mildly sceptical since this is a Sadist showing, after all; it can’t be that bad. But it’s not that great either, with this grungy quasi-industrial rockabilia that pours from “A Tender Fable” which comes like a noisier fable… sorry, version of the Killing Joke neglected B-sides from the early/mid-90’s, the only more pleasant gimmick at this early stage being the nice cleaner vocals that pop up unexpectedly to disturb the hegemony of the harsh shouty main ones.

Ironically it’s “It's Not Good” that first creates a more positive impression with its operatic keyboard-driven drive, a stomping Die Krupps reminder which cements the unmitigated industrial contamination that fans of the 90’s trends would readily devour including some “Meat”, a more abrasive interpretation of the style of the Seattle movement (Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, etc); a tendency which runs through the shorter material as the longer, more seriously-woven one (“Plastic Star”, “Small Great Child”, the dreamy melancholic “Dogs Sledge Man”) is sprawling, psychedelic listening experiences that transcend genre boundaries and accumulate myriad influences, more or less appropriately stitched together. And yet it’s the more simplistic layouts which generate more excitement like the abrasive nervy, “keyboards in grooveland” jumper “Dodgy Fuckin' Cow” or the dancey KMFDM-esque roller-coaster “Welcome to My Zoo”.

Excitement which will be deemed such by lovers of all things 90’s in music as the band’s die-hard fanbase would have run far, far away by the middle of the second song, some of them maybe not ever to return to the Sadist camp… to excuse the band for having woken up relatively late for the possibilities within the past decade would be redundant, to put it mildly; “Crust” was already a dry, sterile entity, a gorgeous one at that; a small industrial upgrade was all that was needed for the guys to conquer this vociferous arena if this what they wanted to achieve with this. They didn’t have to shed their skin almost beyond recognition, not at the dawn of a new era anyway; one that was openly denouncing such past noisy semblances of music.

Still, as an already converted fan to the industrial metal idea (Die Krupps and KMFDM again, but also Ministry, Skrew, Malhavoc, Swamp Terrorists, Rammstein, etc.) at the time, I don’t want to play hypocritical by saying that I found this outing a total throw-away, even back then; there are some bits and pieces that I learnt to like more with time, but the scary part is that I detect more of those with each subsequent listen. Yeah, you’re right, I should simply stop listening to it; I don’t want to be staring at this review some 6/7 years later, wondering what deeply confused, seriously misguided mind had produced these thinly veiled diatribes…

I have to come out in defense of this CD. Far from being an attempt at nu-metal commercialism, it is probably the boldest experiment in Sadist's career. It is certainly their most subversive, and fits in very well with the rest of their unpredictable material. They must have known that they would offend a huge portion of their fan-base with this stuff, but they went ahead and did it anyway. If you are open-minded enough, though, and actually play this CD for more than 3 minutes, it will reward you. As with all Sadist albums, it ends up being an interesting failure-- the odd mixture of styles and tones doesn't always come together completely, but the music always holds my attention. There are all kinds of little details in there. On first listen, the music may sound like a heavy and insipid form of pop-- the riffs are often simple and short, and the arrangements aren't overly compicated. But the music is obviously the work of skilled musicians with a huge knowledge of music. The elements which on first listen sound like mainstream pop and rock actually turn out to be pretty obscure and strange the closer you listen. There are many unidentifiable and weird musical styles in there. The major stumbling block for many people may be the vocals, which have a moaning, almost self-pitying quality to them. I have come to like them for their quirkiness, but many people may find them downright irritating. My favorite Sadist album is probably "Crust," their most interesting failure, but "Lego" comes in a close second.