Noise Exposure - 2012 - Noise Exposure

Post Punk

[FOR FREE]

http://noiseexposure.bandcamp.com/

• 4 songs to download
• For free
• Direct Download
• Listening recommendations: One Last Hit

Impressions

Just keep your head down and nod to the music, this is not going to be sunshine and lollipops. Noise Exposure have jumped headlong into the murkiest depths of Manchester with this self-titled EP. One will immediately hear similarities to Joy Division in the slow, measured guitar riffs that hang uncomfortably in the air, ringing out like leading a funeral dirge and drumming that seems to emanate from deep within the bowels of the Earth itself, the bass vibrating to the surface just enough to make one on edge. I know I throw around genre labels a lot, but 'Noise Exposure' is very much darkwave post-punk in late 1970's, early 1980's sense: gloomy introspection and a sense of sorrow, though the lyrics are at times a little indecipherable here. Craig Dyer's voice is devoid of almost any emotional delivery, detached from the stories he's singing about, and yet still manages to have an air of cynicism to it, as if disapproving and still not giving a damn about your opinion. Delivering lines like “my hands are bound/and I can't breathe”, Dyer makes it sound as if it was an everyday occurrence, one in which the idea of suffocation is not a huge problem for him. It's not particularly deep or challenging content (I doubt Noise Exposure care if you've forgotten Rudolph Hess for instance), but Dyer puts enough in his delivery to keep things from getting outright silly. He comes close to a delighted snarl on third track “Your Boat is Sinking”, which along with “Lush & Slow” have the most straightforward, um, I guess it would be “appeal”. “One Last Hit” ups the psychedelia (which makes sense given the title) and the guitar drone for an almost lighter sound. You most certainly won't be bouncing around in your underwear to it, but “Noise Exposure” is cathartic, a release from the world outside your headphones and worth hearing for that.

PS: No I don't know if that cover art will work with old school 3D glasses, give it a shot if you have a pair.