Thursday 2 February 2012

The 2kDozen 500: #43 - Crosses, "EP 2"

Chanced upon his one via Spotify. Liked the fact the band's name was three crosses (but I can't reproduce them here). It all looked quite Brooklyn and dark.

Then found out that it was a side project of head Deftone Chino Moreno. They were a band that I always meant to give a proper listen to back in the dark days of Nu Metal and the early Noughties. Even the support of Zane Lowe hasn't entirely kicked this idea in the head. But I've yet to remember a single tune of theirs.

This I like though. A bit. It's a bit Nine Inch Nails. A bit Depeche Mode. That moody, serious stuff that should be walked to in slow motion across either a black & white Anton Corbijn desert or some Mitteleuropa architecture. Music with big, bending chords for giants to strut to. Like the good bits in Stiltskin and Babylon Zoo records. There's a curious hormonal reaction to the business, a chill warmth. That Lana del Ray thing again.


I wonder quietly to myself whether "Prurient" isn't directed at a groupie fanbase: all about shutting up and "trying it" and "being excited". Kind of sexless, but fun. "Telepathy" has a nice nagging bassline, stretching out across a big plateau of keyboard. "As long as you play my game/I'll let you win." Is he being sexy again? No wonder he had to start a side project.

"1987" cuts off dead sudden, like. Which reminds me to dig out my cassette of "The Downward Spiral" and give it another go in the car on the way to work. I once put that as my favourite album on a job application: what was I thinking? It was a shadowy time.

Rating: Him out of Deftones.

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