Hella Weird
Hella
There’s No 666 In Outer Space
(Ipecac)
Time is not a factor for Sacramento duo-now-quintet Hella. There’s No 666 In Outer Space has an hour to state its case, but still machine-guns as many notes, time signatures, and beats as humanly possible.
Preceded by last fall’s dizzying Acoustics EP, Hella’s latest album frequently gives the impression there are several bands at work playing more than several songs at the same time. Granted, this works to great effect when planets align periodically and perhaps accidentally like on “The Ungrateful Dead,” but for the most part the album is a jumbled, cacophonous acid storm. Nary a moment passes when either a guitar or the drums aren’t doing more than they should be, like a helicopter sent into a tailspin by a renegade engine. Somehow, in all this racket, new vocalist Aaron Ross brings sense and order with his ironically soothing wail, not so much a Siren on the seas, but a radio tower in an electrical storm. “The hand that rocks the cradle/is setting all the tables in the other world,” he repeats elastically amid a synth and percussion spasm befitting a Boredoms sample spun backwards. Which world? If Mike Patton’s now involved, we’ll say all of them.
— Steve Forstneger
Click here to download “The Ungrateful Dead.”
