Dog "Trash Temple" LP
Side A: Cyborg Messiah, Holy Diesel, Great Frog Diety Of The North, Delightful Flower Of Open Abyss, Living Stone Of The Cave Of The Vapor King, Path Over Sleeping Mountain Giant
Side B: He Waits In Blue For Me, Children Of The Swamp, Key Man Back At Midnight, Ride The Darkness, Ninth Gate To Deep Reservoir
Sometimes the universe aligns itself in mysterious ways. Today I happen to get my wisdom teeth taken out. My face is numb and I have some painkillers. Today I also get to write about the premiere of Dog's new album Trash Temple, a record that most definitely benefits from a bit of medicated strangeness. For anyone unfamiliar with the long-running experimental noise punk/lo-fi grindcore project, the New York band specialize in a sound that's all together kinda fucked up. It's damaged, scrappy, and as unconventional as these sorts of things get. Vocals are growled (like a dog), gnashing it's teeth over a cacophony of abrasive noise with seemingly wordless aggression. Its safe to say this ain't your grandma's noise rock.
Trash Temple is as filthy as it is reckless but for all it's unforgiving grunts, squalls, and mutated riffs... Dog is surprisingly melodic underneath the carnage. Like the rose that grew out of concrete or whatever, their sinister shrieks and convulsing guitars pair together to form the perfect middle ground between avant-garde noise, hardcore, no-wave, and punk at its most demented. It's not necessarily meant to be understood, but to be felt and experienced at loud volumes. Whether you consider Dog to be art-rock's brilliant freaks (as we do) or simply the weird kids making a damn ruckus, there's no doubt you've never heard a record quite like this one. - Dan Goldin
