HEALTH: “RAT WARS”

(Here’s Wil Cifer‘s review of the new album by L.A.-based HEALTH, which was released last week by Loma Vista Recordings.)

The industrial trio HEALTH continues to make artistic noise, with a haunting melody as the focal point of even their most confrontational moments. I have been a fan of this project for some time, but this is the first time I have felt compelled to review these guys here. Rat Wars finds the band to be sonically more appropriate. They have always been metal adjacent, but this time, though they might not be flashing devil horns with their foot on the monitor, it is their heaviest work to date.

As I searched for this album online earlier in the week, I found a comment on Reddit that gave me a chuckle as it referred to this album as ‘The Downward Spiral” for people with two monitors. It’s a pretty fair assessment. The band’s full vision unfolds on this album, opening the doors for the larger metal community to embrace them.

What might be a sticking point for some is also the band’s trademark, the androgynous coo of Jake Duzsik‘s vocals. In my mind, they are the industrial version of the Pet Shop Boys in this regard. It is the feminine energy they bring to the mix that offers the vulnerable contrast to their otherwise apocalyptic crunch.

Thanks to Demi Lovato producer Stint, the vocals are given more love and often presented in double-tracked layers. The only time this creates a pop feel is on the song “ASHAMED”. Even then it’s used in an extremely effective manner. While I do not like when bands like Sleep Token add a pop dimension to their sound, it works better here as the stark downtrodden mood the overall presentation creates balances this out.

The synth groove of “HATEFUL” creates an ambience that is both tense and explosive. The dynamic guitar-forward “CRACK METAL” is carried on the black wings of a more manic underpinning. Sometimes things are more overt with songs like “CHILDREN OF SORROW”, which has an absolute ripper of a riff that kicks the song into motion.

Lyrically this project has always worked from a place of self-loathing, like an addict who has hit rock bottom in a weekly stay motel, pondering the overdose of the hooker found in the bathtub. Then this feeling ripples out into their contemplation of an equally despondent society as they consider their place in it. This feeling is best explored in the song “DSM-V”.

Things end with the closest the band has come to a ballad with ‘DON’T TRY”. This brings to mind the most depressive moments of Placebo, which is once again an acquired taste that might not appeal to all readers here, nor will this album as a whole. However, I do think fans of industrial music and some of the more sonically downcast offerings of experimental music will find this album a pleasing soundtrack to modern times.

As a fan of this band, it’s one of the best albums of any genre I have heard in some time, so I felt it my duty to sing its praises to those with similar tastes who enjoy bleak sounds of high emotional intensity that can become another flavor of heavy.

https://youwillloveeachother.bandcamp.com/album/rat-wars
https://www.facebook.com/healthnoise/