Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

Album: Crystal Castles, III (Fiction)

 

Simon Price
Sunday 11 November 2012 01:00 GMT
Comments

The third Crystal Castles album, which features a photo of a Yemeni child being cradled by his mother after a tear-gas attack, was recorded in Warsaw and Berlin, and deals with themes such as oppression, corruption and other dystopian realities of 21st century living.

It is, you'll have gathered, probably not one for the Christmas party. It may, however, be the album on which Alice Glass and Ethan Kath make the step up from being glacially cool third-wave electroclashers to a far more powerful artistic force.

Produced, for the first time, entirely by Kath and recorded on to analogue tape rather than digitally (it's strange to see a "no computers" policy from a band as futuristic as Crystal Castles), III shudders and shimmers like some massive, monstrous machine. But, when heard loud, the more accurate metaphors come from nature: flashes of lightning at the top end, earthquakes and landslides at the bottom.

As usual, the listener can barely make out Glass's impassioned shrieks, but one cannot mistake the apocalyptic mood and intent. If the Mayans were right and the world really is going to end this December, you won't hear many better soundtracks than this.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in