Simply the most amazing new band you've never heard of, NYC post-punkers Slut 'Em Go command a bewildering welter of genres without getting lost. Imagine the frenzy that would result if X, Rush, Maudlin of the Well, Seven Year Bitch and King Crimson got together in a studio with a couple of six packs and no requirements other than turning out music. One minute into the song "Tesla" I was hopelessly hooked.
There is just no simple way to describe the sound of the album. Vast swathes of electric organ surge; double guitars pound frenetically; volleys of nonlinear wah-wah guitar slither in and out of folk-punk vocal duets; random and totally eccentric time signatures and modes morph temporarily into Sly Stone-era funk, breath deeply and go floating down a long stream where bobs up whispy acoustic runs. A constantly changing picture emerges that could probably only be depicted graphically as a Mandelbrot sequence. If you've seen the film Waking Life, that's one good equivalent from another medium, where the color schemes and art genres change second by second.
Like a prog-fusion KMFDM, S'EG invoke their own presence on several songs -- "Punk Chunk," or the self-referential "6 Absolutely Stunning Minutes of S'EG!"; not to mention the follow-up "6 Glorious Spine Tingling Minutes of S'EG."
"You would have settled for a baby boy/but it's a chicken..." I mean, outside of Frank Zappa, who's had the guts to put out lyrics like these from "Things?" To sum up, I personally nominate Slut 'Em Go for best band/album of the year in an awards ceremony that has yet to be conceived. This is a self-produced album, so your money goes directly to the folks involved. Hours of listening and thinking pleasure.
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