Album Review: Broken Ear Record by Black Dice

In the last few years, Black Dice have built an insular world of future imperfect electronic clatter, cosmic guitar, and tribal chattering. The latest report in their ongoing tale is Broken Ear Record. It's less glossy than either of its full-length predecessors, Beaches and Canyons (2002) or Creature Comforts (2004), and in addition to a bit of grit there is a stronger rhythmic center to what is happening here as well.

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I hate to be a naysayer, but it’s going to be quite a chore for Black Dice to outdo the titanic Beaches and Canyons, a maelstrom whose title is as apt as it is descriptive. It certainly did not happen with Creature Comforts, a meandering, poorly organized effort, and Broken Ear Record also fails more than it succeeds. Where Beaches blended human touch and electricity to create heart-stopping climaxes and an air of constant expectancy, Broken Ear attempts a streamlined repetition of the formula with much more emphasis on the electricity, and the whole does not equal the sum of the parts.

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