Fantomas
Delirium Cordia (Ipecac)
by Fabian Martinez

Dark and presumptuous words to package your album with. It's only upon completion of Delirium Cordia that Dr. Selzer’s philosophical musings set a precedent for the ordeal within that tinted crystal case. Mike Patton’s baby since the dissolutions of Faith No More and Mr. Bungle, Fantomas has evolved into the aural battleground of an unhinged musical id. This is virtuoso metal laced with free-form jazz, modern classical rock and the cut-and-paste aesthetic of the Dadaist avant-garde. A single 74-minute track spanning the entire disc, this is not music meant to amuse you, but to make you re-evaluate the act of music listening.

A super-group three-piece backing band with Buzz Osborne of the Melvins (guitar), Trevor Dunn of Mr. Bungle (bass), and Dave Lombardo of Slayer (drums) provides the soundscape for Patton’s vocal/songwriting disorientation. The simple drop of a record needle kicks off a slow-burning collage of winds, rubber basslines, and sparse drumming that quickly builds to Gregorian chanting, sounds of spilling water, ominous scalpels scraping and a palpable sense of death looming. All this occurs within four minutes, shortly before the listener is subjected to a firsthand acoustic rendition of death. After the autopsy dialogue (courtesy of Dr. Selzer) begins a musical collage that means to interpret death by bombarding the senses with familiar musical sections loosely presenting a bloody, poetic dream state. This is the soundtrack to Hamlet’s “sleep of death” and the dreams that do come are of a pitch black hue, with only the occasional blast of pure white light to stir the listener further into dementia.

This is obviously a labor of love, in which Patton and the band’s every musical passion and understanding of the musical psyche is clearly on display. What makes this album so listenable despite its pedigree is the cinematic scope through which this tapestry is presented. This is music as equally informed by the psychologically intensive film scores by Krzysztof Komeda and Ennio Morricone as, say, Pigface and Slayer. The gorgeously macabre artwork lends the album a sense of arc and most importantly, an aesthetic angle.

By dissecting and deconstructing their obsessions with medical fetishism, musical experimentalism, and the philosophy of composition, Fantomas have created a forum that is free of cliché. Having drawn and quartered their inspirations, they’ve not only held them up to the light but soaked them in every dripping bodily fluid. Never before has a traditional rock line-up combined the above with such zeal for the freak-show that modern music is so capable of. Not afraid of the “freak-out,” dense atmospherics are often punctuated by perfectly timed blasts of classically disorienting Osborne guitar riffs, underscored by Lombardo’s peerless drum work. At time his drum kit appears to be ignited by napalm only to instantly shift to barren cymbal clicks. Dunn does an amazing job sounding equally menacing, jazzy, anxious, and controlled; his rhythmic contractions help mesh much of the band’s interplay. Yet it’s Patton who becomes the centerpiece. Never once utilizing the spoken word, his voice is an equally primal and supernatural presence. An army of voices unfurl as he screams, chants, mumbles, and whistles ethereal mantras that mean to tickle the lobes and unshackle the listener from the sort of pop/folk-based vocal performances we’re accustomed to hearing. Lush production and wraithlike synths add depth and space to the track. The instruments and voices all float over the infinite, embellishing the anxiety and paranoia. As the track progresses, the performances and music become less restrained and there’s an increased sense of slipping into the beyond. This is a band fully aware of how outside their art is and this only further drives the collective conviction and intensity; their ambition lies in the spiritual as well as the musical.

If this review confuses you, then understand that in the context of this music, words may be futile. Few songs, much less albums, manage to have such a monumental sense of intangibility. By recreating a nightmare with sound and song, this album quickly becomes the finest sort of headphone music. It’s a waste to pop this in your iPod for the subway ride to work; that would be a disservice to the love and craft on display. More importantly, no one should regularly subject oneself to this kind of drop kick to the unconsciousness. It should be experienced as a whole, when you need a reminder of the infinite soul-stirring possibilities of music. If reaction is all music can hope to provoke, then this is pure polarization. For every emo-kid that will cringe in terror, the soul of a Sumerian will dance across the plains of our collective unconsciousness. Here is a miasma of horror for the ears. The final 20 minutes are the sound of the record needle running dry, a looped sound of fuzzy analog silence. Could a sequel emerge from the murkiness? Your ears wait for it, while your dreams dread it.