Top 5 Splits of 2012

5. Robocop/Detroit split: Dead Language, Foreign Bodies

Robocop has emerged as one of contemporary powerviolence's more interesting voices, and part of the reason for that distinction comes from their willingness to experiment with the form. What's normally a down-and-dirty genre gets the audiophile treatment on Robocop's side of this split, and the result is a twitching, mutant punk that incorporates saxophones, echoing noise and whatever else it can wrap its tentacles around into a strange, satisfying experimental powerviolence gestalt. The Canadians in Detroit, while opting for a more traditional approach to powerviolence, ramp up the violence and anger with a moshing, throat-bursting kick-in-the-teeth of a B-side that occasionally gives way to 90's post-hardcore sincerity ("Day After Day," the second half of "Pusher"). All that, plus a Jennifer Lopez cover. A well-made, varied split that also happens to come with some of 2012's best cover art and packaging.

4. The Afternoon Gentlemen/Suffering Mind

The boozegrind/slackerviolence of The Afternoon Gentlemen is a stinking ball of fastcore, grind and powerviolence pickled in cheap alcohol and crust punk. Pissed-off, irreverent (and in moments like the Fukushima Daiichi disaster-referencing "Nuclear Terror," truly funny: "Leaders speak to calm our spirits/Crust bands write piles of new lyrics") blasting for the burnt-out crusty in all of us. Suffering Mind, arguably this year's king of splits and per-volume one of the most consistent bands working in their genre today, blast out four shots of Insect Warfare and Discordance Axis-inflected shrapnel (one of which is an Assück cover) with the ease of true A-list grind lifers. Together, these two keep the grind alive on ten tracks of low-stakes but highly enjoyable punk noise.

3. Sete Star Sept/Rotgut

Among the year's most controversial extreme music releases was the sprawling, uninhibited noisegrind omnibus that is Sete Star Sept's Vinyl Collection 2010-2012. For most listeners, it was a hard piece to approach because of its sheer size alone, and many walked away from it as perplexed as when they started. As the enjoyable-ness factor of SSS's side of this split (featured on the aforementioned collection) shows, in small bites, the unhinged and left-field nature of these Japanese grinders can be immensely satisfying. On the flip side, Malaysian grind 'n' roll newcomers Rotgut serve up a classic-sounding set of nasty, lo-fi Asian grindcore heavier on attitude than speed (and surprisingly enough, all the better for it). The perfect 2012 split to satisfy your inner Neanderthal noisehound, these tracks sport a sound that would fit in chronologically anywhere from the mid-90's to last week.

2. Gripe/Diseksa: Indefinite Detention

Politically and socially conscious grindcore, by its nature, rests on one side or the other of the line between pertinent and painful, depending on its execution. Thankfully, then, the overtly socially charged Indefinite Detention (and with a name like that, how could it not be?) sits comfortably on the former side—and happens to rule musically, as well. Gripe's outraged, high-caliber grind is one of my personal favorite recent examples of the form, and the lyrical content of songs like the anti-rape "Ballbuster," the title track and "You Can't Spell Dead Without D.E.A." prove that all that griping comes with some very solid arguments. Diseksa (the second set of Malaysians on this list, further illustrating South Asian grind's continued ascendance) smash out raw, boombox-in-a-room-fidelity crust-grind that does fun as well as it does fuck you (and so well that I'm willing to forgive their use of the first "Oh my God, they killed Kenny!" sample that I've ever heard). An effortless-sounding grindcore tutorial that, especially at the impossible-to-pass-up price of a free download, is a must-have blastbeat-fest for this year.

1. Cloud Rat/Republic of Dreams

I've already said a lot about this split, but considering how much I love it, I'm willing to say a bit more. Cloud Rat might be my single favorite recent grind act, and considering the fact that they seem to get better with each release, stand to hold that honor for the foreseeable future. The mixture of punk, doom and memorable grindcore riffs on their six tracks stuck with me like nothing else did this year (I liked this record enough I almost considered saving it for my top LPs list instead of top splits) and each track oozes emotion and energy in a manner I've mainly encountered on Pig Destroyer's strongest material and Jon Chang's Discordance Axis and Gridlink releases (and the lyrics are at least up to par with the ones from those records). I'll admit that's it's the second side, by screamo newcomers Republic of Dreams, that was the real surprise for me. Every bit as cohesive as the Cloud Rat side, RoD's side made me love a genre I don't usually pay a lot of attention to, and while I'm too much of a Cloud Rat fan to say that this is the superior side, Republic of Dreams is going to be on my new release radar from here on out. Long on atmosphere and emotionality (and longer on catchy riffs), these tracks swing from one polarity to another with more blasts than you'll find in your typical screamo album. This is a split that's determined to avoid any limitations conferred by the form, and if it isn't sitting somewhere in your record crates/on your shelves, do yourself a favor and buy it as a late holiday/early New Years present. No split even came close to this one this year, and if either of these bands' 2013 releases are anywhere as good as this (Moksha already has a tentative place on HaaSL's Best LPs of 2013 list and I've only heard one song from it) expect to see them both on my lists this time next year.

Cloud Rat/Republic of Dreams- Split LP

As a writer, it’s hard not to fall into patterns, especially when taking as specific a focus as “extreme music blogger,” an emphasis that deals in often-similar styles and textures. While these patterns are evident in the writing of me and others in many places, one of the worst might occur when writing about split albums.

For whatever reason, splits tend to be more or less glossed over by music writers, reduced mostly to a competitive structure that assesses which band out-performed the other and whether the loser is an outclassed upstart or an old fogey that simply lost its mojo. This approach ignores the fact that splits, when done right, can be more like full-length albums with a different set of performers on each side (sound familiar, Scum fans?) and it takes an excellent example of the form, like this split LP between Cloud Rat and Republic of Dreams, to jar me and my compatriots from debilitating reviewer lethargy.

Michigan’s Cloud Rat opens its side with the sludgy post-metal of “Burning Doe,” a move that simultaneously bucks expectations and accentuates the strength of the band’s songwriting. While an example of the “slow opening song” trope found on From Enslavement to Obliteration and scores of albums after it, the song is remarkable for two things: firstly, with its Isis-indebted quiet-loud structure, buoyed by blasts near its middle section, it is the rare instance of that trope that doesn’t crib stylistically from early Swans; secondly, it’s one of even fewer examples that has re-playability tied to its own merit and not simply the notion that, “Hey, it’s a grindcore band playing slowly!”

Second track blast-force “Parachute” opts to skip the subtleties and stomp the accelerator out of the gate, offering a memorable, no-nonsense 51 seconds of sweet-spot grind. The song is equally tight instrumentally and in terms of construction. This is what well-made grindcore does: take whatever time it needs to prove its point and then stop. There’s no dignity in wearing out your welcome, and stretching ideas farther than they need to go is as painful to the listener as it is the song structure.

Cloud Rat’s range within their chosen form never ceases to impress me. The stuttery opening riff on “Moving Mouths,” the sludge-courting heavy punk of “Keba” and the transition from blasting grindcore to vocalist Madison's acapella singing on “Stench of Sage” interact side-by-side perfectly without so much as a raised eyebrow. For some time now, Cloud Rat have been among the best active groups in modern grindcore, so the fact that this is their best material to date should indicate something pretty significant.

Republic of Dreams, who occupy the other half of this split, are a German and Polish screamo/emoviolence  three-piece with a focus on the fast and intense side of that spectrum. Grindcore fans looking for a screamo gateway drug will find it in this band, who serves as an excellent foil to the emotional, nuanced grinding of a typical Cloud Rat release.

The contribution from Republic of Dreams is a lean, frenetic bunch of songs, keeping an average length around a minute-and-a-half.

“There’s No Bullshitting Here” opens the side, and begins with a disturbing, minute-long soliloquy seemingly plucked from a horror film (though I can’t place its origin). The sample’s wracked closing scream blends into feedback and punishing chords that dance in off-kilter, disorienting patterns befitting the foggy streets and howling, feral inhabitants detailed by the sample’s breathless narrator. The track plays out like a harrowing chase, complete with pauses, backtracking and an abrupt, violent conclusion.

One of the screamo genre’s most striking features is its marriage of melodic sensibilities to hardcore punk’s standard unrelenting noise. “An Enlightened Macho is Still a Macho” is brimming with noodly earworm riffs but kept grounded by snappy hardcore drumming and emotive, varied screams.

Closing number “(Your) Banality is Evil” slashes out of the gate for its first 20 or so seconds, before sliding into a meditative-but-energetic instrumental section that builds the requisite tension for a final burst and subsequent collapse. Through use of minimalism and repetition, the track builds a beautiful end-of-record momentum that doesn’t suffocate the listener and the band uses just enough negative space to mandate an immediate repeat listen to the whole record.

In the case of both bands, there is more happening lyrically than your typical freeze-dried political straw man arguments or overdone, consequence-exempt violence.

Cloud Rat’s lyrical focus is deeply personal, and sometimes it’s possible to only grab snatches of meaning from the poetry. It seems almost like prying to dissect these songs in a review, but many seem to deal with painful experiences having to do with religion and spirituality, abuse and gender issues. Yet while clearly packed with underlying significance, it’s possible to simply enjoy the lyricism of lines like these from “Burning Doe”: “The leaves have this curl to them; / Racing past, golden hues like wisps of a horse tail not yet fenced in.” There is always more to unpack and discover in these songs, and vocalist/lyricist Madison is quickly proving herself as one of grindcore’s finest writing talents.

For Republic of Dreams, most lyrics are some combination of social and philosophical musings, with an alternately broad and personal bent. Songs from their side deal with machismo, impartiality, social change and a range of other topics, and include the added bonus of commentary on each song from the band’s lyricist. One of the more interesting is the economics-focused “(Your) Banality is Evil”: “Your ‘invisible hand’ is a force of regression / (Taking from the many, giving to the few). / Your ‘trickle down’ is (drop by drop) killing people. / Can you still believe all that nonsense?”

The LP’s packaging makes this a crucial release not just as music but as an artifact. While the individually screen-printed cover means that every copy won’t be an exact replica of the above digital image, it serves as a healthy reminder that this record is made for no one but you and the people who produced it; no intermediaries, no compromises. The booklet is beautifully laid out, and besides the lyrics contains a number of striking visual art pieces. Everything (the covers, the booklet and even the stickers that designate the sides) displays the same amount of care and it feels important. Punk is feeling like something matters and this is punk to its eyeballs.

Because of the quality found across its 20-minute runtime, this split feels truly collaborative. “Winning” or “losing” the record doesn’t apply here, because these artists feel like they’re on the same team. As a result, they manage to produce what is one of the best releases of the year and a must-buy album for dedicated extreme music fans.

You can purchase the split from IFB Records in the USA or React with Protest Records in Europe, or on Cloud Rat's upcoming US tour with thedowngoing.

[Note: Cloud Rat sent me a copy for review.]

[Edit: In the original version of this review, the phrase "vocalist Madison's acapella singing" read "(sampled?) singing" because I was unsure of the origin of the vocal that came after "Stench of Sage," and the phrase "effects-assisted stuttery riff" in the same paragraph was changed to "stuttery opening riff" in reference to the guitar work on "Moving Mouths" because I was unsure how the effect was produced. Guitarist Rorik has graciously informed me that the vocal on "Stench of Sage was Madison performing "Gloomy Sunday"("Szomorú vasárnap"), or "The Hungarian Suicide Song", and the guitar effect that opens "Moving Mouths" was produced not through an effects pedal or other artificial means but through an alternate picking technique.]