Pollution – Black Commune [Review]

01 Black Commune

Listen (Myspace)

If there’s one style I’d like to see find a quiet place to die in 2010, it’s the disaffected, out-of-tune, and reverb-awashed excuse for rock music that infected Brooklyn over the last two years. Vivian Girls? Yeah, I get it. Real Estate? I still don’t get it, but whatever. Pollution is the antidote. Their 2009 cassette n.s.DRUGS is pissed off and loud.

Black Commune starts with a punch to the face, and continues with less than two minutes of pummeling drums and guitars that couldn’t give less of a fuck what you think. The second track, Fuck Hope (yeah! fuck hope!) turns the first track on its head, slowing things down to a crawl as feedback sucks the song into itself. The d-beat returns on Reds, another two minute banger with an attitude seemingly designed to wake Brooklyn from its beach-bummer malaise.

These tracks are followed up by two more feedback nightmares, which is followed by the surprising–but totally appropriate–cover of “Downer” by Lush. (A 90s era indie shoegaze band from London.)

One of the best parts about the whole package, though, is the fact that it was released as a cassette, standing as a giant middle finger to the era of digital immediocrity and stultifying High Fidelity pretenders. It’s almost as if, to really get the full experience, you need to hear the shake-click-clack of the tape dropping into the deck. And that’s awesome.

Listening to Lush, you hear hints of the modern-day Brooklynites. But the Pollution cover adds a palpable attitude that today’s forgettables haven’t been able to muster. Let’s hope more bands take a cue from them.