#devoid of light

The songs buzz and spark with an intentionally excessive volatility. All the hiss in the no-fi production amps up the electricity considerably, but the out-of-control guitar tone and the shattering, clattering cymbal sounds do their own sort of DIY surgery on your bleeding earholes. The opening 15 seconds of “Bleak Future” strike, strike again and then deliberately increase the pace — another old chestnut of a punk routine (“No More,” anyone?) that should be exhausted. But Lexicon’s delivery will have you reflexively gritting your teeth. When you drop the needle on “Shoot to Kill,” the bass reveals itself as a serious force, imbuing the song with a Killing Joke vibe that proceeds to wrestle the fuzzy, buzzy git for control over the tune. Things only get nastier from there.

 The Seattle-based musicians (Will on guitar, Devin on bass, Stevie on skins) play like men possessed — hard to say if it’s Satanic or political spirit at work, but the performance is memorably passionate. KJ is the vocalist, and her harsh, hoarse shouts propel the enterprise, shredding her vocal cords and shedding several layers of mucus membrane. Her cadences on “Idle Hands” are particularly crucial. KJ’s voice is too distorted to allow many of the words to register, so the rhythmic patterns of her vocals become another of the gnarly instruments shaping Lexicon’s feral songs. This reviewer prefers when you can hear the words and tune into the message. But as is often the case in heavy music this raw, it’s likely that the affect is the message. The more blistered, abraded and sore, the better. Songs like “Shoot to Kill” and “Drying Out” leave you feeling skinned and laid open to the foul atmosphere of our post-industrial hellscape. Yikes, that smarts.