Crying Loser - The Ick
We Go to 11!
Cork's Crying Loser release their decrepit, dismantled essence via their debut album The Ick. It's a 31-minute batch of sickly-though-smartly bloomed buds. Choc-a-bloc with oddities The Ick is bound to catch many off guard.
The utterly loose and untethered worlds of The Ick open with the rotted foghorns - bass clarinet courtesy of Sam Clague - of "Do the Jerk". This ship was never meant to be found - set to sail for an eternity through its own mad seas. The crew on board are doing their bit to pull the parallels into alignment; their Universe enters yours without welcome. Frontman Arthur Pawsey rants like a manic depressive with a reason to be anything but. Micheál Fitzgerald - on bass - and Ruairí de Búrca - on drums - lay an earthy, girthy foundation for the illness to flourish out of.
Want all you like, but it's the needs which keep the wheels in spin in this horrible game of yin and yang, give and take, life and death.
'If you say "yes" to pleasure, you say "yes" to pain.'
Intrinsically tied, and nothing without the other, pleasure turns to pain, and vice versa. And faster than you think. The duality serves the sickness on a platter plate. Fit for consumption. Fit for nothing more than self-serving treadmills. Trashcan happiness. Deliriously dandy. The wrong kind of empty; empty-full of shite. Shit-for-brains and one in the same. Brimming with putrid acidity. Irreversible entanglements.
Being taken advantage of from every angle, and forced to eat shit like it was your favourite meal. 'But isn't it better than staying in bed?' harks frontman Pawsey. The machine that gleefully engulfs itself; the greed can't even spare its own.
"Isn't it Better" is home to a few eye-opening, soul-weighing quotables:
- 'Bottomless slums we overfill'
- 'Apathetic to your own apathy'
- 'Sink into the tide of tedium; work for nothing, live for the premium'
Of a cold disposition - underground nuclear bunker, post-war-rock-apocalyptic vibes - The Ick exists in a sphere somewhere out of reach, but not too far to be alien; The Ick is a part of us all. The horrible half-twin. Out there somewhere. Strolling around with your likeliness, the unlucky bastard.
Knowledge beamed straight into your noggin. Unearned and un-asked for. Mental contagion. Incurable. Feral feats. Gordon Ramsay wakes up from a nap with a revelation. 'Now I know which side the bread is buttered.' Life now makes complete sense. Schrodinger's Cat and all that. The puzzle has been put in place. Timelines converge on the pot of mould. The end of the rainbow bleeds every colour but gold.
"Bad Haircut", a spoken word piece - I'm not too sure where the clip comes from but it sounds very late-70's New York No Wave or the sorts - about being 'Punk' - ever-pretentiously - featuring a seedy, tangibly-unsettling backdrop. If you're shaking your head and wondering just what the fuck is going on at times - most of the time - you're not alone. It's psychologically upsetting music; designed to undo your being and tilt you towards insanity. Crying Loser are pulling you down into the hole that they are in.
"Dem Jobs" opens on an Avant-Garde air - not surprisingly off-the-hook. Future Days era Can comes through a little later with breezy basslines and a sauntering swing. Vocal layerings add an unease even within the most calm moments on the record. The Cork lads can't help but make you uncomfortable, like it was your deserving.
"Eat the Evidence" is Wacky Races meets Pink Panther, on a bad one - in a good way. It's seedy, mysteriously deranged, in a backalley-sexy way. The local plug has got high on his own supply and its more than he can handle.
50-seconds of child-like stupors make their way through on "Nine Sandwiches"; the sleazy result of life without anything to grow up into. Flowers still grow though. Said flowers bloom into the final track "Real World".
Step into the fictitious folly. Suspend disbelief, and take the dip.
'Enough talking in the real world.'
