NO-CORE

Social Junk are an experimental duo (often with collaborators) originally from West Virginia and recently located to the ever-growing fun-noise capital of Philadelphia. What I admire and like best about them is how they can’t be easily pegged into one narrow niche. Sure, you could call them “experimental” like I just did, but they’ll only fit into a broad category like that. In our modern era of hyper-compartmentalization and scene fragmentation, Social Junk seem like boundary crossers.

They mash up lo-tech industrial clang, delay-loving moan-wave, organic noise-folk, Wolf Eyes-style creep and scrape soundscapes, and pin it all together with occasional white light/white heat noise-rock. The central and title track on this album, the 15-minute “Born Into It,” is what you’re most likely to get at a Social Junk show. It starts with some indistinct, watery, reverb noises and electronic squeaks. The volume builds as echoing crashes ring out. Then as that part dies out there’s a second hushed part, echoing voices joining. Screeching and howling feedback noise starts to overwhelm things and for a finale the drums roll in with the noise still rising to a dense mess and ending abruptly at the climax. Pretty much a perfect 15-minute I.N.C.-style performance. The other tracks explore different parts of this sonic terrain, sometimes harsher, sometimes more free-form, sometimes more blissful and vocal-focused.

I’ve dropped some terms in describing Social Junk that would normally make me shy away from a band, like “noise-folk” or “moan-wave.” These tags are usually applied to groups that are just a bit too cute and mild for me to appreciate. Social Junk might appeal to fans of that stuff, but haters won’t want to dump them in that crowd, because Social Junk always have an edge, the sounds are never 100% nice, there’s always some lurking tension and you know things could start sounding downright ugly. In the best possible way. These guys just finished a tour with other awesome noise jammers Dick Neff and Mincemeat Or Tenspeed, and they’ll probably be heading out on tour again before you know it.

Social Junk on last.fm
Social Junk on MySpace
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