Unrest
Kustom Karnal Blackxploitation
[No. 6/Teenbeat]
Rating: 6.5
In this world there exist precious few bands, past or present, that are as
fearlessly experimental as Unrest-- and even fewer who would dare issue so
many experiments on one album. Can you imagine if Jim O'Rourke released a
record that contained his early tape-manipulation work, avant-garde guitar
strangling, minimalist orchestral pieces, and a few songs from his
current Bacharach-worship period? It'd be pretty fucked up, and maybe even
mind-blowing, but definitely not very listenable. Which sums up Kustom
Karnal Blackxploitation excellently.
Really now, how are we supposed to feel about an album with a title like that?
And what are we supposed to think of song titles like "Black Power Dynamo" and
"Kill Whitey"? How about a 10+ minute-long spoken-word piece about Sammy Davis,
Jr.'s car accident? Tuneless grunge-metal scowling like on "Invoking the
Godhead" and "Click Click"? A jokey wah-funk song called "The Foxey
Playground" where every time Mark Robinson sneers "She's Foxey!" it recalls
the Beastie Boys' "She's Crafty"? All on the same album?!
Overall, the best thing about Kustom Karnal Blackxploitation is that
Unrest had sharpened their focus a bit since their previous album, the
seven-layer-dip Malcolm X Park (both of which, incidentally, were
first released by Caroline in 1988 and 1990 and are now being reissued
through No. 6 and Teenbeat). More so than Malcolm X Park, Kustom
Karnal reads like a catalog of Mark Robinson's various obsessions, from
Kenneth Anger to blaxploitation films to Butch Willis, a little-known
Beefheartian drug casualty that haunted the D.C. music scene in the mid-to-late
80's. While such name-checking and full-throttle irony was acceptable-- even
cool-- back when this album first came out, these days it's a little bit harder
to handle.
If nothing else, Unrest earned its rightful place in the indie rock canon by
being smart enough to take the five-second snippet of the song "Teenage Suicide"
from the movie "Heathers" and complete it, turning it into a spot-on expression
of confused adolescent melodrama. And then there's "Chick Chelsea Delux" and "She
Makes Me Shake Like a Soul Machine," two soft, pretty songs which point in the
direction Unrest would take their next album, Imperial f.f.r.r.. But
these three tracks aren't quite enough to recommend Kustom Karnal, since
the quality of the other songs depends entirely on your willingness to forgive
Unrest their stylistic excesses.
-Nick Mirov