Search - Flying Luttenbachers :: Infection & Decline

Brutal-Prog!

Christopher Forbes | Brooklyn,, NY | 11/08/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This album is really off my usual beat (free-jazz, 20th century concert music, classical) but this album really kicks. Weasel Walter made his original name here in Chicago doing a particularly punky version of free jazz. But this album has absolutely nothing to do with that sort of music. This is Walter's latest evolution...brutal-prog.First let's get the misconceptions out of the way first. The Flying Luttenbachers is NOT, I repeat NOT a Ken Vandermark group. Ken appeared on only two FL CDs, and neither of them is this CD! All through the reviews of FL albums here on Amazon, everybody seems to think that Ken Vandermark appears on the discs...even the discs on which there is no saxophone to be heard. Secondly, these discs have nothing to do with afro-beat or world music. Some of the reviewers here seem either confused or not to have listened to the music at all. Now to the music itself. Weasel Walter frequently reforms his band, and with each new formation the music changes drastically. This is the first (and last) recording of Walter's last Chicago line-up (he has recently announced that he is going solo again and then will be moving to the Bay Area...so this group will probably not record again....then again, you can never tell with Weasel Walter). The music is totally composed...there is no improvisation on this CD. Walter calls this music "brutal-prog" and that fits very well. It's a mix of progressive rock ala early King Crimson and death-metal like Incubus. Every track on the disc is played at lightening speed. The rhythms are highly complicated with odd time signatures predominating, and the writing is extremely challenging. The band performs with a crispness that has not previously been part of the Luttencacher's vocabulary. The melodic content, such as it is, is tense and dissonant and the music is infused with a high degree of controlled noise. It is a sonic assault that makes groups like Nine Inch Nails and Sonic Youth sound like lilies of the field! Infecktion and Decline also continues the story concept that the FLs began in Gods of Chaos. Both albums (and perhaps others) have an underlying program involving an apocalyptic scenario of alien robots who destroy declining humanity. This kind of concept rock is reminicent of many progressive rock groups from the 70's, but twisted through a darker vision. (In fact, Hal Russell Luttenbacher, who was originally the great Chicago improviser Hal Russell, is now a sleeping robot who will awaken to destroy the world.) Do I take this seriously? No...but it's great fun on a concept album. The final track on the CD is a searing cover of Magma's De Futura. Walter has a particular facsination with this tune. He also covered it on The Truth is a F**cking Lie. This version is much cleaner than the earlier version and even more terrifying than Magma's original. This is maybe one of the strongest FL album. The writing is much tighter. What is lost in spontaneity is gained in ensemble. Kudos to Alex Perkolup and Jonathan Hitchke for tackling this incredibly chanllenging material. Here's hoping that Weasel Walter finds what he's looking for in the Bay Area. He has left behind a facsinating body of work here in Chicago."