UM Review by Bleakest Harvest is here!
http://www.ultimatemetal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=180043
Frantic Bleep - The Sense Apparatus
Elitist - MOSH910CD - 07/02/05
By Patrick Walsh
The term 'avant-garde' seems to get thrown around the place these days to describe any old shite that has something odd about it. Like 'prog-rock' before it, 'avant-garde' has come to describe less what it actually originally set out to achieve than an established sound. In this case, 'avant-garde' should mean something experimental, original and abstract, whereas it unfortunately gets used by seemingly every black-metal band with an Arcturus fetish. Thankfully, Frantic Bleep are nothing of the sort, and an embodiment of what it truly means to be 'avant-garde'. In short, The Sense Apparatus is an original and truly stunning piece of work.
Unlike the pointless technical wankery of Spiral Architect and their ilk, Frantic Bleep know how to go about making one's draw drop whilst creating songs that are inherently listenable at the same time. The Sense Apparatus is satisfyingly heavy (check out the driving rhythms and intensity of the vocal lines of 'Curtainraiser' for instance) and at times beautifully delicate, the darkly romantic atmosphere sometimes recall mid-period Opeth, and the vocals of Paul Mozart Bjorke are sumptuous and wonderfully layered. 'But A Memory' is the most accessible track on offer here, a brilliant riff overlayed with all manner of intricacies as the song gradually builds up into an amazing crescendo.
Frantic Bleep naturally esschew conventional song structures in favour of well-timed twists and turns. There are synths present, and yet they never sound out of place or attempt to take over the central core of what's going on, merely acting as a tasteful backdrop. Similarly, whilst the guitars are as adept and techinical as one would expect from such a group, they are never unneccesarily so; the band knows when to show restraint, and this works to their advantage no end. There is no stand-out track to be found on The Sense Apparatus as they're pretty much all stormers, but 'Mandaughter', with its Ihsahn-esque rasps betwixt some brilliant riffwork comes pretty close. Frantic Bleep succeed where so many of their peers fail; a near perfect balance of tehnicality and songwriting, weirdness and listenability perfectly results in what is the first great metal album of 2005. The Sense apparatus is sure to appear on the top-ten lists of all of a wine-sipping nature.
9/10
