The beauty of Nurse is its uncompromising ability to play at the outer
limits of post punk, post grunge music and be totally convincing about
it. One of the determining qualities of a great soul/gospel singer is
whether or not they truly believe in what they are singing about;
phoneys just don't carry the day which is why James Brown, Tina Turner,
Aretha Franklin and Mavis Staples had the power to effect the listener
in the most profound way - they all had total emotional commitment to
match their musical talents. Nurse achieves that same over powering
delivery.
The music coming from this trio is massive, with big
sounding chords perfectly chosen to carry such a heavy sound, yet
paradoxically some of the riffs may have their origin in something as
innocuous as an Irish jig. Tension continues to be cranked up by a super
charged grunge gone into over drive that suddenly plunges into release
by duo interplays of bass and drums while sustained razor edge guitar
tones hover and recede. This is a sound that blows Joy Division clean
out of the water and reminded me at certain moments of early Pere Ubu.
It makes Oasis sound silly and transcends Nirvana to the outer grunge
limits. I'm convinced until told otherwise that the opening bars to the
track 'Gone' are a doffing of the hat to the Velvet Underground's
Heroin, while bringing the cello in on that same track is surely the
masters touch.
Finally, due to the spacious sense of the
recording, you need to have the volume up for the full sonic delivery.
Unlike another reviewer who found the sound thin, I haven't been left
with that impression at all, just have the volume well up and you
actually get the full dividends of a cautious engineering decision -
plenty of bloom and resonance with no strain or distortion. The bass is
full and fabulous, the drumming tight in tuning and execution and the
lead vocalist/guitarist carries the day with conviction. I also have the
sneaking suspicion that Therapy's Nurse has influenced a lot of
wannabees who just can't cut it, turning out limp watered down attempts
that pale to insignificance next to this blistering original. Hear for
yourselves.
~Wayne Dawson
Loud, explicit, grating, troubled, tortured... this is Therapy? I feel better now...
Track List:
1. Nausea
2. Teethgrinder
3. Disgracelands
4. Accelerator
5. Neck Freak
6. Perversonality
7. Gone
8. Zipless
9. Deep Sleep
10. Hypermania
pass - fbsvw
Rebooted...
Originally posted November 11, 2014
