Venetian Snares – My Love Is a Bulldozer

June 16, 2014 • Planet Mu Records

Finally, the breakcore master is back with his first new full album in four years. It may be my blind, raging adoration for Snares' music but I don't think his output has gone downhill at all like many people seem to think, and My Love Is a Bulldozer continues to keep things good.

The frantic 7/4 Amen-break chaos obviously hasn't gone anywhere, and the energy is solid as ever. Anyone who's heard a Snares album before pretty much knows what they're getting into with this one. It's not quite as dirty and raw as Filth and doesn't have the same silly aloofness that My So-Called Life showed (well, mostly, if you don't listen to the title track too closely). It's kind of a mashup of the crazy sample-heavy style of Detrimentalist with the pseudo-orchestral style of My Downfall—which is an awesome combination for me, at least.

There are a few interesting new things thrown in, such as the jazz style of "10th Circle of Winnipeg" and "Shaky Sometimes", a sort-of-dub thing in "Your Smiling Face", and the jaunty classical guitar of "8am Union Station", to name a couple examples. Still, I'm thankful for the occasional no-frills vanilla track like "She Runs" with just drums and electronics—pure Snares doing what he does best.

There's also a noticeable increase in the amount of vocals—and not just cut-up samples; I mean full-on written and performed by Funk himself for this album. Even though he's sung on his albums before, I can never really quite get used to it. With the classical and other softer stuff they're alright, if a little disconcerting (of course, that might be the idea). On the heavier breakcore tracks, they do their best to fit in with the music but it seems impossible to get them to ever click completely.

I don't know if My Love Is a Bulldozer is going to bring around anyone who has lost faith in Venetian Snares' recent output, but for me it's still an impressively good album and one definitely worth checking out. No, maybe it's not pushing any particularly new ground, and maybe it's still a bit too irreverent and a bit unfocused, but if you want something intense and surreal and maybe even a little thought-provoking, there's not much better you can do than some Snares.