VANITY OF THE TONGUE - Reality Fantasies

"Hailing from the economically depressed wilds of Eastern Pennsylvania, a _¢‚Ǩ_ìremade/re-modeled_¢‚Ǩ¬ù Vanity of the Tongue (few may recognize them from two micro-run cassettes of crudely recorded bass, guitar, rhythm box and wholesale negativity under different moniker) return as full band to deliver a debut long player as ambitious as it is confounding. Devised over countless budget pints at the Chicken Lounge, West Allentowns premier nite flight destination, Reality Fantasies consists of four well-considered portraits of bleak, modern existence, contrasted with drastic re-workings of song-as-source material. Eschewing implicit conservatism and convention in favor of a disorienting palette that places it in conversation with such time-tested classics of hardcore confusion as Disease is Relative, Psychedelic Inferno and Language of a Dying Breed (_¢‚Ǩ_ìconversation,_¢‚Ǩ¬ù get it?), the focus on reorganization and self-reference draws as much from the likes of Unser Debut _É Sechs, M.B. c. S.F.A.G. 81 or Lucier-esque pure sound experiments as it does any outfit associated with the making of aggressive, song-based music. Destined to become an apogee of no-scene hardcore punk (if not in this day, then perhaps when lizards return to walk Earth upright and discover it buried among the grounds of Denver International Airport), Reality Fantasies stands on a plane of its own contrivance, celebrating a Future of complete sound freedom whilst engaging in a hapless trawl through the decadence destined to rip mankind to pieces. Are you a slave man or a pet boy? Do you revel in pig shit? Listen and have such important questions answered." - Crisis of Taste