Radio Berlin has a big, huge, jarring, thunderous, dramatic sound that I have been completely bowled over by. Rhythms as powerful as a man flayed and turned inside out, that his beating heart becomes his voice. Skree guitars that flaunt melodicism as well as those of Big Black and the Birthday Party. Bass so deep it seems to have been dug up from within the earth. Everything about the music is pushed, exposed, and fearless.
Their heritage of influence is equally impressive. Raw and open like what you hear on live Joy Division recordings. Broken down structures like the initial Siouxsie and the Banshees records. Broad and dramatic like the Sisters of Mercy. Glamorously fractured like Bauhaus. All of this without sounding as if aping a bygone era. The guitar on the Glass opener "Gauze" bounces up and down in pitch like those of June of '44. The syncopated bass and guitar in "The Hyphen" sound like a direct reference to the Jesus Lizard. All of the songs are textured and nuanced with electronics that sit seamlessly within the atmosphere of each track.
Records like Glass are befuddling to fake rock critics such as myself because the cheap comparisons cannot sum up the inexpressible elements that I find so compelling in the music. What I have written is at once accurate and only half-truth. There is a passion in this music, a life in it, that I cannot capture, but is its most potent element. It cannot be explained, only felt.
Sister Sounds is a record of alternate versions and remixes of songs from Radio Berlin's two earlier albums. As is the case with such projects, it offers mixed results and will likely be of appeal to those who already have an affinity for their music or for the work of the remixers. Of note are a hyperactive remix of "Change Your Mind" by Hot Hot Heat and very nice tranced-out and glitched-up remix of "Twelve Fingers" by The Epidemic.
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