Brobdingnagian — Pretty Magoo Cancer

This album from Portuguese purveyors of the weird Brobdingnagian, has been brought to the public’s attention via a triad of labels, namely; Universal Tongue, Rusty Axe Records and Perpetuam. 'Pretty Magoo Cancer' is Brobdingnagian’s second official LP, the first of which was released by Rusty Axe back in 2008 and just as the album title suggests,  they wield an unearthly sense of the bizarre and unconventional...sitting somewhere between all out noise, black metal and psychedelic experimentalism.

Kicking off with a caustic mix of distorted drum patterns, healthy doses of noise, various tinkering and disjointed, warbling synth lines, 'In a Hallway. In a Doorway. In a Room' pretty much lays down the intentions of this act from the off. Ridiculously over the top, Brobdingnagian clearly don’t take everything as seriously as most that inhabit a similar musical sphere of experimental music. Breaking into one hell of an intense noise squall three quarters of the way through the opener, their game-plan is to completely throw you off guard. Previously dulled down sub bass tones break through to the foreground and play games with your innards and before the track is through, the piece takes on another face entirely as unexpected black metal style vocals and dissonant guitars kick into touch.

 Shards of electricity introduce ‘Their Wormlike Tongues Gouge Out My Eyes’, before a cacophonous blast of tortured black metal, thoroughly drenched in distortion and confusion pierces the melee. A darkly twisted sensibility pervades the entire track, breaking away from any kind of conventional structure and branching out on its own destructive path into pure noise oblivion. A lot of the obvious black metal influence is pretty much eradicated over the course of the following track, giving way to an approach more typical of Power Electronics embracing elements of HNW with the relentless ‘We are the Carriers of Infection’.

The album’s title track finishes the job, the black metal influence is back, but not for long as Brobdingnagian wander off down space jam avenue, pulling one final surprise before the record is through. ‘Pretty Magoo Cancer’ finally degrades and slips away amidst a maelstrom of overdrive and distortion, leaving you feeling mentally exhausted, but definitely enlightened. I certainly don’t think we will hear the last of this project, whilst it is thoroughly entertaining, I definitely feel that Brobdingnagian have the ability to up the ante somewhere along the line…one to keep an eye on.