Creepy, disturbing, eerie: these are the words that immediately spring to mind while listening to this Leeds duo's full-length debut. While perhaps less abrasive and marginally less warped than last year's 'Murder Sleep' EP, 'Cannibal Work Ethic' sees the anonymous pair explore a range of sonic avenues to unsettling effect.
The first track, 'Love is a Cage' features the vocal talents of Mongolian multi-media artist Tsendpurev Tsegmid, although his contribution sounds for all the world like an Ian Brown sample as the few lines he sings are looped and gradually intercut with another looped fragment until the phrase from which the song derives its title dominates the mix.
It's a shade deceptive, given that the track is reasonably accessible, and therefore not entirely representative of the rest of the album. From hereon in, things get tougher, darker, stranger, with the child's voice that narrates before eventually being cut down to a single short loop on the darkly twisted 'Teddy Hop' that even steady rhythmic electroindustrial hum of 'A Savage Invitation' can't draw back and lift the mood from: not that it tries too hard, with a subsonic bass drone and relentless mechanised percussion forging a bleak drone of a sound.
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Similarly, 'Swimming Over Mountains begins with the promise of a lighter mood before the relentless loop fixes itself in your brain and the subliminal fear chords and discords begin to slowly set the whole thing off-track.. or is my mind playing games with me?
'Cannibal Work Ethic' is not an album you can cozy down with, or ever really settle down to listen to: it's designed to keep the listener constantly on edge, and while The Truth About Frank can be bracketed within the experimental field, they've clearly drawn their territory and are exploring the sonic parameters with a view to creating a specific desired effect. That effect is uncomfortable, disquieting, and occasionally disorientating, even nauseating, especially on the clanking, lurching 'Shadow Sex'. It's challenging, but also rewarding. And whatever them truth about Frank might be, I very much doubt it's pleasant.
The Truth About Frank on My________
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