Meth Drinker – Oil [2014; Always Never Fun Records, Raw Birth Records]

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On their second album, the New Zealand group of Meth Drinker continue brewing noxiously harsh sludge, with grinding guitar feedback, thrumming bass reverb, and guttural vocals gnashing at the words.  The track titles do most of the imagery direction due to the unintelligible singing, with names like “Convulsion”, “Catalepsy”, and “Narco Terror” lending things an impression of asylums and drug abuse.  A couple of spoken-word sections break out of the wailing strings with surprising sharpness, and the album as a whole achieves an unnerving flow of oppressive texturing.

The Jackson 5 – Dancing Machine / Get It Together [1975; Motown]

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Pulling both of its songs from the band’s 1973 album Get It Together, this single opens with that LP’s closing track, “Dancing Machine”, a finely-crafted piece of disco funk.  Pumping along on a firm percussion line, augmented with horns and bass, the group’s vocals sweep and slide, though the single version is unfortunately about a minute shorter than the LP cut.  The album’s opening title track is pushed to the B-side, but while it doesn’t hit the same highs of energy, it still turns out a solid groove, with the instruments upstaging the singers.  Quite a nice slice from the era.