DIE HAUT AND NICK CAVE
Burnin' the Ice
(Hit Thing)
cd
15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
I (Andee) don't know too much about the super complex and convoluted history of eighties post punk / industrial / whatever music (Einsterzende Neubauten, Die Haut, Birthday Party, Lydia Lunch, etc.) but I do know how totally blown away I was the first time I heard this record (that was just about 2 weeks ago). Hey, sorry! In the early eighties I was busy beginning my rapid descent into metalheaddom! Anyway, this is Die Haut's 1983 debut full length, only now finally getting the deluxe reissue treatment 20 years later, and man has it withstood the test of time remarkably well. Perhaps most well known for Nick Cave's guest vocals (although guest vocalists on other Die Haut albums have included Kim Gordon, Lydia Lunch, Deborah Harry, Blixa Bargeld and loads more), Burnin' The Ice is a chaotic, jagged slab of swampy propulsive gloom rock. Acidic dual guitar melodies slither and intertwine over pounding heavily reverbed drums and throbbing distorted bass. Cave's wailing testifying is the perfect match for Die Haut's intensely bleak sludgescapes.
A dark and desolate mix of punk, surf, sludge and gloom. Think Joy Division, the Bad Seeds, Gun Club, Birthday Party and the like. Actually, a much more apt, but way more obscure comparison would be the late great Lubricated Goat (one of Allan and Andee's favorite bands). Not just because they are Australians like Mr. Cave, but because they too trafficked in the sludgy, driving darkness that Die Haut got so right on Burnin' The Ice. In fact now that I've finally heard this record, I'm a little suspicious that Lubricated Goat owe more than a passing nod to the band that was doin' the Lubricated Goat thing at least 4 years before they were. Burnin' The Ice is a relentless musical death march, blighted and austere, grim and funereal, and so so good.
MPEG Stream: "Stow-A-Way"
MPEG Stream: "Truck Love"