Useless Eaters, Hypertension [Review]

Useless Eaters

Hypertension

(Jeffery Drag Records)

Feb. 19, 2013

On the surface, Useless Eaters’ new LP, Hypertension, is a genre exercise: a raw, mid-fi slice of moody and raucous garage punk, which would sit nicely alongside the 1978 catalog from formative UK indie Rough Trade. Razor-sharp guitar riffs and spare, nervy keyboards swirl above relentless beats and prolific mastermind Seth Sutton’s often heavily treated vocals. Many players in the current garage revival borrow the bent and bubbling takes on pop music that create a pleasant sense of discorporation in late-‘60s psychedelia. While no less disorienting, the warbling modulations on Hypertension are cold and industrial, an influence one might credit to post-punk artists like Swell Maps, Wire or Gang of Four — or even Gary Numan and Devo, minus the heavy synthesizers.

However, it would be a mistake to let the strong pull of nostalgia shift focus from the social conscience behind the sounds on Sutton’s latest full-length. A self-described army brat and high school dropout, 23-year-old Sutton has found himself on the social fringe for most of his short life, an experience which has sharpened his distrust for the prevailing trends toward fragmentation and compartmentalization that touch nearly every aspect of present-day society. Outsiders saw these forces as withering creativity and critical thinking in the 1970s and '80s, and throughout Hypertension, Sutton reminds us that they're just as powerful in the Information Age.