Gravity Kills
Manipulated (TVT)
by Sheril Stanford
Life may be like a box of chocolates, but despite what they say in the movies, sometimes you know EXACTLY what you’re gonna get. If you buy a box of chocolate-covered cherries, for instance, you’re gonna get fake chocolate coating, a strange “cherry” of a texture and color not normally found in nature, and a disgustingly sweet, gooey syrup which WILL ooze down your chin unless you put the whole thing in your mouth all at once which you cannot do without vomiting. On the other hand, sometimes one box is filled with a glorious and varied selection calculated to surprise and delight: hard, chewy, soft, fluffy, fruity, crunchy, mushy, sticky… It’s hard to find something you don’t like in such a box.
Ditto for Gravity Kills‘ Manipulation , a killer collection of remixes. It’s tempting to dis Gravity Kills for trying to be all things to all people. Problem is – they’re good at all of it. Trancy, dancy beats, brutal metal riffs, industrial clamor and snarled pop vocals. So if you liked Gravity Kills’ first self-titled offering, no question you’ll go for this collection of remixes and maybe you’ll like these cuts even more, because they take some chances, pushing the band deeper into all the sonic directions they lean toward, without losing the essence of Gravity Kills.
“Enough” has five lives – the danceable “Critter’s Carnal Remix” and the pounding industrial metal of the Martin Atkins(Pigface, Killing Joke) “White Light Remix,” sly and churlish. Ministry’s Al Jourgensen takes a turn as well, adding some surf to his signature sound and the P.M. Dawn Expanse Remix” slows it way down on yet another version. The Praga Khan “Jungle Remix” adds deep drum and bass, along with a Farfisa organ and muted horns, to “Down.” Then Lords of Acid offer their “Power Remix” of the same cut, imbuing the song with frenzied sexual energy. Fans of slow and dreamy will like the Mark Saunders (Tricky) Remix of “Here” and the Done Brothers (Suede, Pulp) Remix is equally haunting, but the best “Here” is The Hell Everyone Misses (White Zombie, Prong) Remix. The disc ends with two brutal mixes of “Guilty” – the Juno Reactor Remix and the Roli Mosimann (The The) Remix, pushing the song as far over the edge as it can go before it collapses under its own weight.
