Review & Full Album Stream: Beesus, 3eesus
Posted in audiObelisk, Reviews on March 30th, 2020 by JJ Koczan
[Click play above to stream 3eesus by Beesus. Album is out Friday on Go Down Records, More Fuzz Records and New Sonic Records.]
As the title hints, 3eesus is the third full-length from Roman heavy fuzz rockers Beesus. Also their first offering through long-established Italian imprint Go Down Records as well as More Fuzz Records and New Sonic Records, the seven-song excursion spreads languid and loose across 40 minutes that are alternately spaced and driving and swinging and rolling, with guitarist/vocalist Francesco Pucci, bassist/vocalist Emiliano Gianni and drummer/vocalist Adriano Bartoccini putting a clear priority on sonic diversity throughout. Consistency is maintained through the tones of the guitar and bass — that is, the fuzz is thorough — but after the push of opener “Reproach” and the spacier “Sand for Lunch,” third cut “Suffering Bastards” offsets its hooky nodder chorus with verses of spoken word on the way to a jammier second half marked out by airy soloing and unbridled groove.
Having all three members of the band ready and willing to contribute vocals adds to the band’s ability to build more complex arrangements, and even as the wall of fuzz overwhelms the shouts of centerpiece “Sleng Footloose,” those shouts clearly arise from different sources and are themselves something of a shift from what’s come before. Those who’ve followed Beesus across their two prior outings, 2015’s The Rise of Beesus (review here) and 2018’s Sgt. Beesus… & the Lonely Ass Gangbang! will find the elements at work to be familiar, particularly with the latter, which expanded on the more straight-ahead approach of the debut, but while it wouldn’t feel appropriate to go so far as to call 3eesus experimental, there’s no question the band are actively working to push their sound in multiple directions, thinking of the album on its own terms with individual cuts serving a larger purpose within the whole. Those efforts are successful across the 40 minutes of 3eesus, right down to how “Sand for Lunch” teases some of the more psychedelic aspects of side B’s “Flags on the Sun,” “Gondwana” and the scorching closer “Sacoph.”
In some ways, whether it’s the interwoven layers of synth in the opener or the overarching Fu Manchu-style groove they offset, 3eesus reminds of some of fellow Romans Black Rainbows‘ melting-pot take on grunge, fuzz and psychedelia, but Beesus bring a more terrestrial sound on the whole, and the multi-vocalist aspect is a distinguishing factor that, along with the persistent sonic changes from one track to the next, helps distinguish Pucci, Gianni and Bartoccini from the arguably forerunning counterpart three-piece. Beesus are nonetheless well at home in the psychedelic flourish of “Sand for Lunch,” calling to mind a ’90s drift without being shoegaze or post-rock, letting the bass and drums carry the guitar across the chasms of its own making, like a river cutting through a canyon.
The elements at work in “Sand for Lunch” are exceedingly well balanced without purposefully sounding like it, and the band are able to affect a laid back atmosphere and a looseness of rhythm even though they’re very clearly pushing the song ahead toward its break before the five-minute mark at which point a more solidified low-end riff takes hold and the three players lock into the progression and ride out through the final chorus. That song, surrounded on side A by “Reproach,” “Suffering Bastards” and “Sleng Footloose,” is something of a triumph for 3eesus, and it’s doubly fortunate that it acts as a precursor to some of what the second half of the record brings with the final three tracks. The more the merrier, as it were. That’s not to discount what they do across the rest of side A, which is to bring more than just a feeling of variety to the work in terms of quality, whether it’s the structural play of “Suffering Bastards” — the chorus lyric, “We’re never wrong,” repeated as an anchor for some of the LP’s most out-there fare — just to point out the success on the part of the band in terms of tying the material together despite the shifts that take place particularly early in the proceedings.
And when it comes to the massive groove of “Sleng Footloose,” well that’s just good fun, and all the more as 3eesus‘ centerpiece. “Flags on the Sun” follows immediately as the longest individual song at 7:29 with a Doors-y night-in-desert — the time of day somewhat ironic given the sunny title — openness of tone and a relatively patient unfolding compared to some of what comes before; a clear indication of the shift taking place from side A to B, even in the digital realm. Deceptive in its melody, the track moves with marked fluidity and a gradual forward progression, not building to a huge payoff, but instead bringing in (seemingly) all three players on vocals toward the finish and capping with a somewhat understated flourish of drums behind distorted strumming guitar, the arthouse-grunge vibe palpable. “Gondwana,” which takes its name from the Neoproterozoic supercontinent made up of India, Arabia, Australia, South America, Africa and Antarctica, revives some push in its second half while also calling back to the spoken word of “Suffering Bastards,” but still draws atmospheric impression from “Flags on the Sun” prior and even as it moves through its shouts just prior to six minutes in, it does so with the current of effects/synth running alongside swirling to the inevitable fade at the conclusion and arrival of “Sacoph,” which, in contrast, seems to be named for a grocery store. Go figure.
The final cut begins with a righteously slow nod and some scorcher lead work from Pucci, and that sets the tone for what follows as the band with three singers decides to go it instrumental at the end, letting the guitar ring out into open space with a clarion shimmer underscored by the weight of the bass and accompanying fuzz. There’s a kick of tempo in the second half, but they end slow and dramatic and that feels well earned after all the various turns preceding, both within and between the songs. As much as that’s a somewhat inevitable focal point of 3eesus, the greatest effect it has on the band’s work overall is to emphasize the cohesion with which Beesus are able to unite the material. I don’t know whether the tracks were recorded live or not, but the feel of band-in-a-room is palpable, and it’s that singular energy that most comes through in drawing songs together as a singular presentation. It enhances the various strengths of the trio and only makes the listening experience richer and more consuming, which would seem to have been precisely their intent for it.
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