The Psychotic Monks — Pink Colour Surgery
The Psychotic Monks are a noisy, dissonant post-punk band from Paris, France. And 2023 sees them release of their third album, Pink Colour Surgery, on FatCat Records.
I had never heard the band's music before, but was quickly impressed by their funky, foot-stomping heaviness and clever melodic hooks from the singer, who recalled at different moments Public Image Ltd and Killing Joke. Comparisons could be made to more recent groups like Slaves, as well, who have a similar way of driving home a simple riff with crushing power, although this group's work is more abstract, and not particularly focused on lyrics.
This record has a dirty, saturated sound and live energy, which serves the style well. There's a lot of thick, grimy fuzz bass tones and some electronic noise in certain passages. The combination of experimental noise textures with active rock drumming is not unlike Pigface's classic "Gub". The singer's introverted, somewhat mumbled delivery reminds me of Chino Moreno's performance on "Adrenaline" at times, or David Yow of Jesus Lizard, taking advantage of the mic's ability to muffle and saturate the voice by pressing his mouth against it.
The group's manic energy reaches a truly impressive fever pitch at times, particularly in a track like "Crash". The processed squall of effects rises like a blaring alarm siren as the pounding rhythm underlies it and the vocalist utters manic snarls that would make Einsturzende Neubauten proud. Some of the most interesting moments of the album lie in the heavily processed segments that nearly cease to be any kind of rock.
"Imagerie" is, by contrast, a sublimely melodic moment that reaches into a dream-pop, crooner romanticism. Other tunes like "Décors", as well, contain falsetto and dreamy beauty stylistically similar to Radiohead's "The Bends", and hint at an entire other possible world of delicate indie rock this band would clearly be capable of creating. "Décors", in particular, is one of the greatest songs on the album, ending in a stormy climax with a surprising trumpet solo and the singer's wail of "What's on the menu tonight, if not human meat!?".
It may often be classified as 'noise rock', but this album has as much to do with industrial history as rock, and brings back the wildly experimental spirit that groups like Neubauten and Pigface brought to the table. The group expertly crafts tight, well-organized melodic songs over highly experimental and sometimes blaringly atonal settings, perfectly balancing chaos and order, and managing to stay easily listenable with short song lengths. One of the best experimental albums and also one of the best rock albums in recent memory. Highly recommended.