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Let's call it electro-stentialism, or nouveu nihilism - that brand of desolate dance music that eschews pure hedonism in favour of a bleak wail into the abyss. Black Lips, Hearts Revolution; all that screechy 8-bit electro blah. Cynics might align Crystal Castles with this dark-hued, hipster scene. In truth, Crystal Castles have nothing to do with fashion. Their power lies in their ability to conjure visceral emotion from seemingly inhuman noise - namely Ethan Kath's digital distortions writhing under Alice Glass's agonised vocals.
Yes they're bleak, but this runs far beyond an ambition to be achingly 'now'. Crystal Castles, for all their associations with the Klaxons and Skins, transcend zeitgeist. To listen to this debut album is to be cast adrift in a vortex of deafening pain without a safety net. The sound they create on tracks like 'Vanished' - as lyrics skip by in a elliptical burble of indistinct enunciations - encapsulate the feeling of being young and alive in 2008. The doubt, the fear, the itchy self-destruct trigger finger; the feeling you could do anything in the world, but that nothing would ultimately mean anything. Crystal Castles simultaneously reject and embody Generation Empty Gesture and fire out a cacophony of existential impotence.
While their music may sound robotically callous, make no mistake about it - this electro escape hatch sends you into a turbulent atmosphere of profoundly human emotion. Mostly gnawing emptiness. A blast of famed studio experiment, Alice Practice, or the resolutely unintelligible Xxzxzcuzx Me prove that Crystal Castles are honouring nothing meaningful. It's a stark here and now, and you can forget that fuzzy embrace of musical heritage too. As instrumental splurge, 1991, demonstrates; this is the soundtrack for 20-something chaos seekers who grew up playing Ataris rather than listening to Kraftwerk.
Weilding sonic light and shade, tracks like Magic Spells downshift to mellow, ambient meloncholy. It's a loaded, chilled epic clocking in at 6 minutes, barely able to power its way through a lethargic dose of comedown hugs. With such sublime depth on offer, Crystal Castles marks a nuanced emotional territory that dance music never covered before. --Sophie Hammer
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
I did enjoy this album, but I have to be honest, it wasn't quite what I was expecting! After reading other reviews and some interviews with the band (who seem VERRRY weird and subversive!) I was expecting something a lot edgier, more challenging and difficult. And while there is the occasional strange wig-out and the vocals are often quite harsh and dischordant, large parts of the album are fairly conventional melodic electronica, and really quite gentle at that, you could almost say ambient! In fact, I was sometimes reminded of Aphex Twin's 'Selected Ambient Works Volume 1', or of Boards of Canada during their more upbeat, melodic moments - especially because of their similar use of vocal samples. Not that there's anything wrong with that at all, just, as I said, not quite what I was expecting!
12 of 15 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
I have been waiting for this album for a while since the track "Air War" was included on a Rough Trade compilation from a couple of years ago. The Toronto duo have turned out a fascinating clutch of songs which reminds one of the best of leftfield electronica of the past thirty years. There are scrappy, distorted tracks such as "Alice Practice" that evokes a saturday afternoon in an amusement arcade and then there are smooth, haunting recordings such as the six minute "Magic Spells" and the single "Crimewave". Definitely a band to take notice of.
8 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
This is a curious album. On the whole it's got some reasonably good light housey/electro tunes, with a distinctive French disco influence. It's not a revolution in music, it won't blow your mind and make you re-consider everything you know to be music - but it's not bad as background music. If someone had recorded this in 2005, it might have been brilliant.
Unfortunately, it seems that an insane woman (possibly an ex, she seems very angry) has broken into the studio at nights and screamed over a few of the songs. Whether the three songs affected were left in by accident as nobody at the record company noticed, or they were included for some sort of post-something art expression, I'm not sure. Either way, if you delete the mp3s of the songs the album becomes a surprisingly bearable listen.
Also, someone seems to have mistakenly added a bit of DFA1979 to the end of the first song, but it sounds good nonetheless.
How curious indeed.
Unfortunately, it seems that an insane woman (possibly an ex, she seems very angry) has broken into the studio at nights and screamed over a few of the songs. Whether the three songs affected were left in by accident as nobody at the record company noticed, or they were included for some sort of post-something art expression, I'm not sure. Either way, if you delete the mp3s of the songs the album becomes a surprisingly bearable listen.
Also, someone seems to have mistakenly added a bit of DFA1979 to the end of the first song, but it sounds good nonetheless.
How curious indeed.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Dark, Desolate, Beautiful
I bought this after falling in love with courtship dating and becoming completely captivated by the wonderful alice glass and it did not disappoint. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Julia Havard
Amazing album
Came across a few tracks on Youtube recently, and loved them so much I bought 2 albums :)
Published 21 months ago by C. S. Carbon
Crystal Castles
Saw them on Jools Holland one evening and quite liked - however this album is rubbish.
Published 22 months ago by R. Hoodless
Crystal Castles from She-Ra?
Just thought I'd note that the blurb says they're named after the She-Ra cartoon? I'd have thought the 80's videogame "Crystal Castles" would have been a more likely source, given... Read more
Published on 29 April 2010 by E. Brandon
Furious Thrashings
Like the sweet-but-sick sounds of Towers of Asia, the Toronto boy-girl duo of Ethan Kath and Alice Glass create everything from adolescent plastic pop suitable for Dance Dance... Read more
Published on 2 Mar 2010 by Faux
A unique and enjoyable dance collection
I first heard about Crystal Castles through brilliant teenage drama Skins where after a traumatic incident involving one of the character's fathers, he was caught up in an... Read more
Published on 20 Feb 2010 by Stampy
replayability
It's loud, crunchy electronic music with emotional highlights. Not all the tracks are playable for a party but a few are just fantastic (Vanished, Air War, Good Times) and the... Read more
Published on 23 Jan 2010 by M. Monaghan
You Need To Buy This Album!
Crystal Castles are a two piece, male/female electronica band originating from Toronto, Canada. This band has changed the electronic Indie genre for the better. Read more
Published on 1 May 2009 by D. Cunliffe
Bouncy Castle Bohemians
Imagine this.
Imagine a time when our inveterate need to compare became less important
than sitting back in our easiest chair and listening without prejudice. Read more
Imagine a time when our inveterate need to compare became less important
than sitting back in our easiest chair and listening without prejudice. Read more
Published on 21 Feb 2009 by The Wolf
Mediocre electronica
Well, I will not deny that this album interested me when I first heard 'Alice Practice' at a mates house. A great song, edgy and yet very emotional, quite a punch in the stomach! Read more
Published on 29 Nov 2008 by Scarhurzt
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