TUMIDO
– the orgy
(CD,
Trost)
Austria seems to be a good breeding ground
for heavy rock duos, and I pronounce my judgement almost solely based on the
existence of Reflector
and Tumido.
Maybe it’s something in the water. Or the moon that just don’t know when
to quit. Anyway, it is clear that Tumido deliver more than just a shiver.
They punch out pounds and pounds of heavy bass / drum rock that efficiently
and magnificiently swirls between NoMeansNo (in their best phase, which was
“wrong”), The Ruins (how could you not mention Tatsuya Yoshida in a
review about an intelligent drum / bass duo, when The Ruins after all are
the definite benchmark of all things drum / bass duo-esque) and a gazillion
other influences, both obscure and obvious.
For all that matters, Tumido are far from
being another instrumental duo, firstly because they excel all those other
instrumental duos in the excitement and emotions they spread. And that is
especially pointed at the long line of instrumental duos from the USofA that
seem to constantly tour Europe and who always seem to excite me for the
first two songs and then the level drops sharply and they bore the hell out
of me for another three quarters of an hour. Then they usually run out of
songs and leave the stage, but in most instances I have long retreated to
the bar or to some place else, like home. Maybe it is because touring as a
duo is so much easier than a full band, and therefore we get these so much.
There are a hundred exceptions, of course, so don’t get uptight yet, I
didn’t mean neither Om nor Sunnn0))) or any of your favorites. I can’t
tell you the names, though, because I tend to forget them.
Back to Tumido, secondly, a special point
about Tumido is that for an instrumental duo they have long tried to get to
grips with vocals. They have collaborated with lyricist Stefan Rois, they
have shared a stage with Bulbul and KK Null together. I always have big
concerns with bands that say that they use vocals as just another
instrument, because that is leaving out 50 % of all that is possible to do
with vocals. That special level of words or at least utterances that signify
clear and direct meanings to the listener is a very different and wider step
than playing a certain guitar sound. Ask Little Richard to get a better
understanding of what I mean.
Tumido have started to incorporate vocals
more and more, though taking the unchartered mid-road they have stayed away
both from words as well as from vocals as instrument. “the orgy falls into
two parts”, the first is the first six songs, where they add growls, moans
and screams that are clearly human utterances to their music. Definitely a
fitting act for these primal rockers and stompers. The second half, which
consists of one song named “muskalica”, that is over thirty minutes
long, is a completely different thing all together. After a misleading start
with another NoMeansNo-sounding superriff, the song breaks up during the
first minute and a sort of male choir starts singing a short line of notes.
Over and over again, with the smallest syncopations and changes it seems,
but it might also be the same thing again and again. The vocals win out over
the rock, the chant is bigger than the scream.
