Win SHRED YR FACE tickets. Click here to enter.
Sign up to the only NEWSLETTER worth reading. Click here.

The Dear Hunter: Act III - Life and Death

Tagged with:
The Dear Hunter

Written By:

Aidan Williamson

12th June 2009
At 17:53 GMT

8 comment(s)

Support new music: choose from our favourite new albums this month.

"What's the deal with the black guy in the helmet?", "I thought Corleone was the good guy?", "Wasn't the Matrix supposed to be good?" - All valid questions when entering the third part of a saga cold.

We arrive on the scene of former The Receiving End of Sirens front-man Casey Crescenzo's magnum opus with this, the third part of a six-act story which has something to do with falling in love with a prostitute but not being able to withstand her constant whoring.

You can pretty much take it as a given that our pretentious-meter exploded when first exposed to The Dear Hunter. Google "Crescenzo", "overblown", "explosion", "legless" and "orphans" and you'll see the results. It is likely the kind of album where a very serious discussion was undertaken prior to its inception as to whether it should should be written entirely in Latin.

English won out though, and we're rewarded with a capricious mix of Muse, The Mars Volta, elemental-era Thrice and The Sound of Animals Fighting. All delivered with a South-American twist. Nothing says 'epic' like a plodding piano, four-part vocal harmonies, chanting, and marching snare drums: all within the first minute.

It's impossible not to be impressed by the scope of Life and Death, when first-track-proper "In Cauda Venemum" (Latin for 'In the tail is the poison') makes its entrance the sheer sound of the drums is extraordinary and meshes perfectly with the post-hardcore inspired vocals.

By the time the mighty behemoth of a track "The Tank" has also arrived, jaws are set to 'dislocated'. Trading off huge stomping verses with a chorus to make the angels themselves tremble.

This effect is rarely repeated thereafter. Sadly, the fifty-six minutes we spend with Crescenzo is 95% pomp and only 5% fun. While it is a tremendous piece of music, it's more arduous a listen than any album should be. It's as if someone told you a magnificent story, but left out all the adjectives. There's nothing to grab hold off, nothing to spur the imagination, nothing really to relate to. What you hear is exactly what you get.

Any who cite The Mars Volta's one-song live shows as a This Is Your Life moment will be more than satiated here. The rest of us though, would like to have at least half as much fun listening to an album as the musician did recording it.

Rating: 5 / 10

Bookmark this page:

User Comments

Comment By:

David

commented 9 months ago

I'm not sure I understand your review. You say it is "a tremendous piece of music" but yet you give it a 5. It isn't the "fun" you are reviewing it is the music. If The Dear Hunter doesn't give you something to relate to then you must have had a very perfect life with no mistakes (other than this review). And if it doesn't spark you imagination than you didn't have one to begin with. Next time just try to review the music, because you obviously don't have any right to talk about the other stuff.

Rate This Comment:

I Agree Comment Sucks

-5

Comment By:

theoellington

commented 9 months ago

i was just about go into astonishment that a deerhunter record could get a score as low as that when i realized my mistake!

Rate This Comment:

I Agree Comment Sucks

Comment By:

James

commented 9 months ago

My good sir,

I believe your review to be ten times more pretentious than you believe Crescenzo and his third album to be.

Rate This Comment:

I Agree Comment Sucks

Comment By:

Bill

commented 9 months ago

Here is how I interpreted your review. You have an intro saying it is a trilogy, then proceed to say the music seems pretentious (without explaining why), then you say it is eclectic in a manner leading the reader to believe this is enjoyed, then you say you don't like it (without explaining why).

If I poorly read it I am sorry. If you think this is correct, could you clarify?

Rate This Comment:

I Agree Comment Sucks

Comment By:

LISA

commented 9 months ago

Well. I would try to oppose your viewpoint, except you had nothing substantial to back your opinion up. How is it pretentious? How is it all pomp? I don't get it. And as for not spurring the imagination...it's a story. Stories, by nature, do exactly that. I find TDH incredibly inspiring, myself. So don't insult them for the sake of insulting them if you're not going to even have the decency to explain yourself.

Rate This Comment:

I Agree Comment Sucks

Comment By:

Dave

commented 9 months ago

"Go get your gun" isn't fun? Or is that part of the "5%"?

Sorry, but I'm afraid I also completely disagree with your review. I don't even know how to respond to the line where you say:

"It's as if someone told you a magnificent story, but left out all the adjectives."

Act III is their most and one of THE most in-depth, detailed, interpretive, magnificently story-driven albums I've ever heard. To say anything otherwise is just nonsense. Whether you like or dislike their music is a personal issue, but to say their is no flavor in the music and it sparks no creativity is just silly. That is basically what The Dear Hunter is about. To also say that nothing after The Tank is worthy of the rest of the time that occupies the CD is also just silly. Though Son and Father are two tracks that are slightly depressing, they are the only two tracks that are so, and have their special place on the CD for a purpose.

I don't have much else to say, I'm not sure how else to respond to this review.

Rate This Comment:

I Agree Comment Sucks

Comment By:

Koby

commented 8 months ago

I don't understand why author's such as the author of this review manage to contribute to websites such as this. Judging from the comments, it's so blatantly obvious that this guy has his finger no where near the pulse of the attitudes of the music-listening public.

The album is a remarkable achievement, your review is short sighted and ignorant and for those reading this review, you'd do yourself a far bigger service by simply reading these comments to get an idea of what the album is actually like.