Plague Songs
Label: 4AD
Length: LP
Media: CD
Format: Album
WorkNameSort: Plague Songs
Just in time for Christmas, what could be better than a little musical meditation on how vengeful and recriminatory God can be? Commissioned for an English art event in September that visually and sonically revisited the 10 Biblical plagues, each song on this disc finds a different artist sharing their vision of holy terror. While the atmospheric heebie-jeebies delivered up by a Brian Eno/Robert Wyatt plague-of-flies collaboration may be none too surprising (even with Wyatt’s insect interpretations), the stark horror of Scott Walker’s baritone colliding with a gospel-choir-on-meth (‘Darknessâ?�) may be the creepiest four minutes ever committed to tape. Abruptly starting with an unhinged rap by Klashnekoff and wending its way through a wide variety of sounds ‘ Laurie Anderson, Imogen Heap and Cody Chesnutt are all present ‘ Plague Songs is the least consistent and most dramatic concept album released in years.
This article appears in Nov 22-28, 2006.