Hyperspace 2025
National Wrecking Co. II
Fierce and furious as befits our times, hard rock veterans offer up their sophomore effort as sacrificial gift to the gods of ruined life.
Scratching the seven-year itch might not be on Jimmy Kunes and Randy Pratt‘s minds – lately, among other endeavors, the singer was busy with KUNES CLARK BAND and the bassist with RUFFYUNZ – but the pair’s return to their old haunts isn’t loaded with relief. While NWC’s self-titled debut felt heavy enough, its sequel could emerge only on the post-pandemic landscape, in which chthonic, “Heaven And Hell”-like coldness replaced bluesy clangor, painfully rooted in this world’s current affairs. Merging anger with angst and inviting a few prominent friends, one of them posthumously, the American players created a perfectly cruel album that will send a shock to the system long after the last of the record’s brilliantly blistering numbers got dissolved in silent, yet strangely exhilarating, dread.
Relentless and merciless, these pieces are apt to cleanse the listener’s soul, but their anxiety is still palpable. It’s only fitting, then, that epic “Overture: Mechanized Confusion” features, alongside the ensemble’s principal guitarist Jesse Berlin, the late Bernie Tormé and feeds infernal riffs into futuristic symphony before Kunes’ oratorio-esque vocals carry his words-charged stanzas to the front where, once the primal groove has been bared, Pratt’s rumbling notes anchor it all to airy reefs. However, if “Red Alert” takes nervy funk further into psychosis, fueled by Tracy G’s six strings, to make verses seem recited rather than sung, the track’s hysterically delivered choruses drive the overall sonic panorama into space, the expanse which should diminish later on to create catchy claustrophobia in the “Isolation City” whose monolithic, yet atmospheric, lyrics and melody feel easy to relate to, because they reside in the audience’s memory anyway.
The infectiously gloomy “All The Rage (Nonna Duanna Nuanna No)” may add “profits” to the platter’s morbid vocabulary and render the earlier hints at prophets quite salient, but the cosmic effects-stricken “Egypt” is the point at which the band gain momentum and begin to properly rock, something they turn into frenetic dance in “Mad Elaine” that the swirling passages of Don Airey’s Hammond wrap into jovial jazzmatazz. And though there’s righteous roaring in the streamlined “Holier Than Thou” and the sludgy “Holy Cross” that attack warmongering hypocrites over impressive instrumental jive, “Caravan” follows a rhythm-shifting path, propelled with Bobby Rondinelli’s drums towards arresting insanity. So when the cinematic, dynamically stinging “Good Man Down” brings things to a close, emotional fatigue and triumph of spirit vie for the final sway only to let the entire album become the winner. A solid work.
*****
