“Who needs a music video by The Body when my mental images of the bodies of The Body just doing their thing on stage are terrifying enough alone, amiright? Like, just picture Chip King shrieking, his throat stretched wide — it’s a straight up maw, and his beard billows over his guitar in the low stage lights. Can’tcha just see it in your brain? All of his half stack amps surround him. And there’s Lee Buford behind that mammoth drum kit, and the bass drum rattles at a sludge tempo, and he’s hammering on that snare as hard as he can, beard also billowing. Just stand still and watch the air ripple around those cabinets. Who needs abstraction when reality is so grim???”
Naw. The Body knows that a little obfuscation can work wonders; that their colossal doom-sludge beatdowns, layered thick with string accompaniments, choral vocal arrangements, and looped noise elements, drip with terror enough to inspire all manner of grisly visual experiences. Remember the clip for “The Ebb And Flow Of Tides In A Sea Of Ash?“ Yeah.
Here we have the video, directed by Richard Rankin, for “An Altar or a Grave,” a cut from the duo’s forthcoming full length Christs, Redeemers. Press play and sink into the murky water off the pier. Your feet get caught in the pond flora. Other feet, already bound, get caught in the pond flora. Other bodies sink into the murky water off the pier. It’s too black down there to see anything, really. Or… You see hooded figures, perhaps King and Buford themselves, come down to join you. You see these figures later, too, back on dry land, rippling across the ceiling in the glare of a neighbor’s flood light. You see them standing behind the half-open closet door. You see them reaching out in the blackness behind your eyelids.
Christs, Redeemers arrives on October 15. You can preorder the deluxe 2xLP or the CD from Thrill Jockey.
• The Body: http://www.thrilljockey.com/thrill/The-Body
• Thrill Jockey: http://www.thrilljockey.com
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