Mars Volta - Scabdates

Scabdates, a mostly live recording of The Mars Volta, is the opposite of white noise: Painful chunks of discordant sound that make noise for noise’s sake. With the lack of studio polish, the improvisation spins out of control, and as soon as the electric orchestration finds beauty, it loses it again, a sacrifice to some unknown god of artifice. These are far from the “A” sides of Deloused in the Comatorium and even further from the “B” sides of Frances the Mute. These “C” sides—impossible as that sounds—are more a nightmarish warm-up than anything productive. Some fans will no doubt love the creepy dubs of babies wailing and overlapping voices on “Abrasions Mount the Timpani.” Hopefully, they and The Mars Volta will then wake up and realize that this, more than a distortion of sound, is a defilement of music. I have great respect for the stamina that goes into performing a forty-minute piece like “Cicatrix” (and its respective “Parts I-IV”), but simply making noise isn’t enough. This behemoth of a song starts out strong, with some of the progressive, vivacious spontaneity of their previous works, but it quickly peters out into idle experimentation. No sooner does “A. Part I” justify this eccentric behavior than “D. Part IV” ruins it all with fragments of samples, aimless and honestly heartless. “Take the Veil Cerpin Taxt” becomes nothing more than a showcase for some impressive fingering, and “Caviglia” is just a sonic bore. Even when there’s a catchy rhythm fueling these musical perambulations (“B. Part II”), it’s all just going in circles, and when all is said and done, nothing is said or done. The Mars Volta is dangerously close to bankrupting its reputation by churning out this unedited stream-of-consciousness. Talent and energy get you so far, but The Mars Volta may have just run out of gas. [www.themarsvolta.com]