The Glitch Mob trio first made waves with "Drive It Like You Stole It," a track that landed a #2 spot on XLR8R's Top Downloads. I remember hearing the innovative, ensnaring, heart-dropping beat that made its way into almost every mix of mine for the next year. Their first album, Drink The Sea, was assertive and seductive without verging on the edge of an industrial, highly stylized sound that they gravitate toward in their latest release Love, Death, Immortality. While the album's title signifies a highly dramatic happening and spiritual tremor, the content doesn't line up with its packaging.
Most of the tracks use a glitch-heavy synth, sticking with one tone level as the driving percussive element that gives a monotonous and repetitive motion. Even though most EDM music circles around point out the fact that it is repetitive, there are ways to release the pressure, like Glitch Mob has shown through their previous efforts. Songs like "Skullclub" function on low fuel, only to be revved up too quickly and jerked around by the neck, with voice-changer growls saying "we are the wild ones." "Mind Of A Beast" lacks melody and reverts to a high-pitched over-trebled phrase to carry the song through.
What does save the album are the guest-vocalists that appear on almost every other track. "Becoming Harmonious" features Metal Mother, whose voice is deep, sultry, and an appropriate contrast to the consistent computer-twitches accompanying the main harmony. It's more luxurious, lengthy, and drawn out tempo-wise as the previous panic-attacks. The star of the album is "Beauty of the Unhidden Heart" with Sister Crayon on vocals. She sings, "I feel it all again" to graceful harp strums until an all-embodying synth pours over. Still, there's been stronger uses of female vocalists in the past (cough-cough Kaskade's "4 AM"). For now, I'm going to look back four years and put on "Drive It Like You Stole It" and pray that Glitch Mob turns back time in their next release.
Grade: D+
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