Posted on 06/29/2009
Many eclectic musical acts have found themselves at home amongst the various and difficult to define styles shared by the artists on the Mush Records roster. This approach to artistry gives favor to producer and visual artist Sleeper – a producer who modifies electronics and other forms of random gadgetry to craft a sound rooted in hip-hop but vastly different from those rigid confines. Sleeper’s new disc, Behind Every Mask, is ambitious, crowded, tense, sloppy and artful – sometimes all at once.

“Abdomen” begins the disc – the track employs a minute-long buildup before distorted keys and random vocal samples filter in and out. The mood that the track inspires could best be described as paranoia. Dread is also another word that could apply here. There are drums fading in and out the mix but they play second fiddle amid the chaotic blends of sound. The album seamlessly blends into “9th Grade,” where again distortion rules the middle of the mix but there is a decidedly heavier rock influence present. “Witch Hunt” continues in the rock-influenced tradition with a stronger emphasis this time on mood and pace. Not much happens differently regarding tempo, but it is a shift from the preceding tracks. “Mr. Megatron” is a dialed down version of the tracks before it. By this point, the seamless nature of the LP begins to make sense but there is a redundancy. Would this be a detriment to the project? No. It certainly makes for good theater and inspires one to sink into the music more. “Faulty” is on the quicker side, thankfully, but it isn’t necessarily more musical. The drums are harder, the sounds even more random – perhaps the most normal sounding of the tracks before it. There is excellent use of transition in the drum programming that helps the song to stand out.

The mood shifts from mutated arena rock and becomes another animal altogether as the disc goes on. “Frequency Winda” is flat-out creepy in parts and just plain strange in others. The weirdness continues artfully on “Gone” where Sleeper again brings back the distortion and forces you to acknowledge its presence regardless of your ear’s comfort. This is perhaps the record’s greatest strength. One cannot simply play this project aloud and not be affected in some way. By the time the disc’s closer, “Failure To Communicate” appears, the tension will stick to your skin long after you’ve hit stop. Sleeper has not made an easily digestible record. In fact, some may even call this LP amateurish slop. Nevertheless, there’s something happening on the disc that, if anything, deserves a full and devoted listen just once.

- D.L. Chandler