LET'S ALL EMOTE

I tend to serialize albums.

Back in the day, I spent months listening to the first side of Murmur, then eventually, more months listening to the second side.

When I fell for Hissing Fauna, it was initially enough to listen up to or through The Past is a Grotesque Animal, and then stop. After about six months of that, I would either start with that song or right after it, and then on through to the end, my obsession unabated.

I've now made it through the first five songs of David Comes to Life by Fucked Up. Which, frankly, is further than I might have expected to get with an album that is so centered on retro hardcore hoarse-whispering vocals. I mean, Christ, I had no use for Henry Rollins in 1984, let alone now...

But I am finding something charming about the whole affair, right down to its four-act rock-opera lightbulb-factory soul.

In my dream world, where EPs are king, this thing would have come out as four individual one-act discs, with a new disc released every other month or so. Which would have saved me the trouble of trying to self-serialize the damn thing.

But since the responsibility is on my shoulders now, I don't know if I'll ever get past Act 1...