The Bodies Obtained

From The Top Of My Tree

(Finding You Attractive)

Record Review by Marcel Feldmar

Slightly disturbing but at the same time melodic. The Bodies Obtained, I think, may have listened to Gary Numan & The Tubeway Army’s ‘Replicas” a few to many times. This band, hailing from Detroit, is creating some strange synth-driven world of their own. Post apocalyptic electro wave that you can almost dance to. It’s moving through the retro-moves while pushing into the future, all at the same time.

There are some soft, almost non-musical moments, with what seems to be a song structure layered over effect-heavy spoken vocals. Then there are little hints of “We were thinking about playing a New Order song, but we really don’t want to, so we’re going to see what happens when we combine some Klaus Nomi, Skinny Puppy, and Marc Almond. So there.”

While remaining still cold and computerized, the Bodies Obtained manage to infuse a little bit of humanity within the songs, which are often moving on a slightly different wavelength than my mind, and perhaps, the lyrics. The fourth song, “I’m A Stranger”, pulses out like Kraftwerk on codeine, with the vocals falling like some lazy Tear Garden outtake across the waves of synth. There are definite ties within these twisted and almost pop songs to bands like Joy Division (recognize this lyric, “This is the room, the start of it all / No portrait so fine, only sheets on the wall / I’ve seen the nights, filled with bloodsport and pain / And the bodies obtained, the bodies obtained…”?)

There are also moments that shoot straight through to some The The darkness, like listening to the vocal tracks on “Dusk” while the music plays on some random electronic-glam confusion, taking possible inspiration from Throbbing Gristle, IAMX, and Tangerine Dream. Now I’m getting really confused, but still, I think I likes it.