Ryoga - Meme

Originally posted at www.thesilentballet.com

Score: 7/10

Ryoga’s previous effort, in the form of their last EP release Ryoga, didn’t really do that much for me. While I’m sure that fellow TSB reviewer Zach Mills is a pretty astute fellow when it comes to cherry-picking the best releases of 2008, I wasn’t really feeling his selection of this odd, electro-post-rock four piece from Sunderland. Still, he awarded them 7/10 and like most who read that review, I gave the band a fair try, but still never really “got it,” much like that Captain Beefheart album that “like totally hits you with its layers on the seventy-fifth listen…" I’m sure it does by the way, I’ve just yet to make it to the seventy-five mark.

Anyway, on we move with Ryoga’s new effort, Meme, a five track EP totalling just over twenty minutes. While there is only a fifteen-or-so minute difference between the aforementioned Ryoga and this new EP, what really struck me about Meme was that on the first listen, this new record didn’t sound as, dare I say it, dense as their last release. Of course, there are other factors involved that made me prefer this release. For a start, it is part of the wonderful new Notes series, an internet based movement that promises a real life, clutch-a-copy music ‘zine in which bands can showcase their sounds on a 3” CD. Clearly, Ryoga’s involvement in this group pushes their cool points through the roof, although I’m sure Zach would argue they were already sky high.

Meme suggests a band that have already come leaps and bounds since their last release. The songs are smoother, the transitions between fading endings are seamless and the vocals fit that perfect, snug mix of not being too overbearing or overshadowed by the surrounding accompaniments. The quartet behind this wonderful release have clearly honed in on their skills for sampling. For me, Ryoga had moments where the sampling was perhaps too “chunky” - as in it didn’t feel like it belonged there and its role was simply to fill dead air. On Meme however, all the samples employed fit around each songs ethic. In “Naked for No One,” the soothing looped chatter compliments every single second of instrumentation; it’s a real testament to the band that there are no moments when clarity is compromised by lethargic electronics.

Of course, this review is all based around personal favorites, so anything I pick comes complete with a barrel load of subjectivity, but if I had to pick... I’d say that “Tango Down/Evac” is one of the most impressive songs I’ve heard this year, regardless of genre. Opening with a claustrophobic industrial drum that recalls Jacaszek, another standout of this year, and ending on a resonant high note with a melting pot of synth and scale sliding guitars, you can even forgive the fact that the first synth note in this song sounds like the opener to Sam’s Town by The Killers.

For those of you that suffer from attention disorders, you’ll be pleased to know that the EP doesn’t recreate the same ideas in each song; you’ll find no “cookie cutter” moments here! A song's theme stays just one idea in a plethora of different styles that seep through this EP. If you’re looking for a dark jangling guitar, you’ll find it in closing track “The Milk of Human Kindness”, but just as you begin to repeat this tune's hypnotic rhythm in your head, you’ll be thrown into a land where synth rules and the guitar is moved away to the distant sidelines… If you can keep up, Ryoga offer up one hell of an adventure and I certainly recommend it.