MY RUIN
THE BRUTAL LANGUAGE
 Undergroove/Rovena

My Ruin's career has been nothing if not tempestuous, and this new album - a couple of years after the last and on yet another label - is testament to their staying power in the face of adversity.

Since the last album, the band have lost half their members, with both bassist and drummer leaving abruptly under mysterious circumstances. Although the album had been recorded before they left, founding members Tairrie B. and Mick Murphy decided to remove them from the tracks, and Mick filled in the missing parts himself. You have to resent this guy - not only is he a shit-hot guitar player, but he also kicks ass on the rhythm instruments too! If you didn't know better, you've never suspect that only two people are performing on this album.

Opening with a moody spoken word extract from Nature Boy, The Brutal Language rocks with a sense of purpose and potency that is hard not to adore. Following the genre-bending multipurpose metal grooves of previous album The Horror of Beauty, the album has a more 'positive' outlook than My Ruin veterans might expect, especially given the recent history of the band. Tairrie's vocals are still as aggressive as ever, but the anger is less upfront this time round - suggesting that the band no longer feel the need to defend themselves against detractors. And nor should they, as few bands out there could match this in terms of power and beauty. Pumping, no-bullshit tracks like The Devil Walks, Imitation of Christ (yes, the religious fixation is still there!) and the salacious Vince Vaughn are as good as anything the band have ever done, and Mick's guitar playing is gobsmackingly great as he cuts loose with more freedom than we've previously heard. Only a rather redundant cover of Mudhoney's Touch Me I'm Sick - an original that is near impossible to top - seems unnecessary.

So, gloriously good. Let's hope the new band can live up to this on stage!

DAVID FLINT

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