It’s pretty clear Genghis Tron have been doing some interviews. They mention it a couple times in the chat below, that they’ve been asked a lot about the change in sound they’ve undergone with their new album, Dream Weapon (review here). Hey, fair enough, right? Not only did their third album arrive last month some 13 years after their last one, 2008’s Board Up the House (discussed here) — both are on Relapse, which also issued their 2006 debut, Dead Mountain Mouth — but it also saw the founding duo of Michael Sochynsky and Hamilton Jordan surrounded by half a new band, including vocalist Tony Wolski and Sumac/Baptists drummer Nic Yacyshyn. Then on top of that, you add the fact that their new work brings synthesizer and vocal melody to the fore in a progressive, almost psychedelic-New-Wave vision of electronics-inclusive rock, moving beyond the “spazzcore” or “cybergrind” of their earlier outings and into a newfound hypnotic ether of enduring swirl, and yes, absolutely you’re going to get some questions about it.
I honestly haven’t seen much of the response to Dream Weapon in terms of reviews, but I know for sure I dig the record, so the chance to talk to Jordan and Sochynsky about it was something I welcomed. It took some scheduling, but we managed to nail down a 9AM time earlier this week and as I finished off my morning coffee — Jordan noted he’s also an early riser — the two main songwriters in Genghis Tron talked through the process of writing largely pre-pandemic but still remotely, as well as restructuring their band both in personnel and sound. I didn’t get to ask about working with Kurt Ballou after such a long break, but you’ll note that Jordan credits the GodCity producer with making the connection both to Yacyshyn and Wolski, so one way or another, he’s definitely had a significant impact on who and what Genghis Tron are in 2021, and that’s before you get to recording the album. And in any case, I’m sure there are other interviews you can find out there that ask the question what it was like to be back with Ballou with the passing of so much time. I was happy to talk about the building of melodies and songs coming together pieces at a time, the birth of Dream Weapon around what became its de facto centerpiece in “Alone in the Heart of the Light,” and so on.
Before you dive in, if you stick around the video long enough, you’ll find Sochynsky and Jordan giving the “breaking news” — they laugh when they say it — that they’re starting writing again already, and are planning to get together next weekend in-person in order to hash out material toward new songs and, one assumes, an eventual fourth long-player. Something to look forward to there, but as you’ll see, there’s plenty to talk about with Dream Weapon in the meantime.
Enjoy and thanks for reading/watching.
Genghis Tron, Dream Weapon Interview, April 20, 2021
Genghis Tron‘s Dream Weapon is out now on Relapse Records. The album can be streamed in below via Bandcamp and more info on vinyl editions, etc., is at the links.
The essential narrative of Dream Weapon, that Poughkeepsie, New York’s Genghis Tron have returned from over a decade of hiatus to issue a new album, hardly tells the whole story either of the band or the record. Picking up where they left off in some ways — Kurt Ballou at GodCity producing (also Ben Chisholm and JJ Heath, and Heba Kadry mastered), Relapse Records handling release duties — guitarist/keyboardist Hamilton Jordan and keyboardist Michael Sochynsky have revitalized the band with new vocalist Tony Wolski (The Armed) and drummer Nic Yacyshyn (Baptists/Sumac), the latter of whom is the first non-machine drummer the band has ever had, whatever doubts his work in the culmination of the title-track might raise about that whole “not a machine” thing.
Coinciding with the new personnel is a shift in sound. In 2008, when Genghis Tron — even their moniker ringing out with aughts-era indie irreverence — released their second full-length, Board Up the House (discussed here), they had already grown beyond the let’s-play-grindcore-with-electronic-dance-parts that made their 2005 Cloak of Love EP and 2006’s Dead Mountain Mouth debut long-player such a challenge to no-fun metallic convention. Those elements were still there, to be sure, but the band had worked to unify the varying sides of their sound into something even more their own. Dream Weapon is another 13 years’ worth of progressed. Comprised of eight songs running a tidy 45 minutes, it draws readily from extreme fare when it so chooses — the mathy chug of “Single Black Point,” for example — but is more akin to heavy prog or kraut metal or some such ultra-specific microgenre than it is to grind-plus-EDM.
Something that has carried over is Genghis Tron‘s ability to maximize the impact of a riff, to create tension and then open wide and allow for a release thereof. The payoff in 10-minute advance single “Ritual Circle” is an example of this but by no means the only one. The earlier “Pyrocene” arrives after the intro “Exit Perfect Mind” and (re-)establishes that pattern as well as the more melodic, used-to-enhance-atmosphere, echoing, willfully mellow wash-over of Wolski‘s vocals that becomes another theme throughout Dream Weapon and a defining aspect of Genghis Tron circa 2021. The addition of Yacyshyn‘s live drums isn’t to be understated either, particularly as the album’s title-track follows “Pyrocene” with a still-melody-topped percussive thrust that is gorgeous, rolling and consuming. By the time “Dream Weapon” chills, a little past its midpoint, the steady beat becomes accompanied by is-that-a-second-layer tom hits and keyboard flourish that provides the record with a standout moment. It feels a bit as though Genghis Tron wrote three or four more LPs over the 13 years since their last one and didn’t tell anybody but kept growing all the while.
The ambient instrumental piece “Desert Stairs” provides a breath of serene drone before the seven-minute “Alone in the Heart of the Light” shifts Dream Weapon into its next and even-more-immersive stage, hypnotic keyboard lines intertwining atop an insistent but not unwelcome snare before the vocals recede for a time, return in barely more than a whisper over more far-out-directed synth melody. As a foreshadow of “Ritual Circle,” which follows, and “Great Mother,” which closes following the penultimate semi-return-to-ground “Single Black Point” in between, “Alone in the Heart of the Light” probably ends side A of the vinyl but is effectively a bridge to the second half of the album, rife with melodic wash and individual intent.
“Ritual Circle” begins mellow and swells and comes in waves and — in a way Genghis Tron have never done so effectively — is patient in how it unfolds. True, it hits its crescendo by the time it’s at its halfway point, with Wolski‘s vocals layered in a call and response, subtle but there, as the drums crash behind and the keys and guitar lead the way into the motorik thrust that defines the song from shortly before the six-minute mark onward. Bouncing but entrancing, if there’s a ritual dance to be done anywhere, it’s there, but the drums drop out early and intertwined layers of beats and keys finish, leading directly into the more forceful chug of “Single Black Point,” the band choosing to let the end of the song prior be its own moment of reflection, peace, or maybe just recovery.
Because it is staggering. “Single Black Point” is instrumental, and like the song before, it ends with keys, giving way to the more foreboding, lower notes of “Great Mother” to finish out, but its purpose is more than simple movement as well. It sets up the arrival of “Great Mother” — one assumes that’s Earth itself — which features a not so disparate payoff from that of “Ritual Circle,” but does it twice, with more forward guitar, and feels more like a summary of Dream Weapon as a whole for that. There are vocals and keys at the end, but by that point Genghis Tron can close however they want — they’ve made it abundantly clear they’re working on their own terms, outside of the band they were but still evolved from it in a way that can only be called organic despite the alleged irony of so many electronic aspects to their style.
One might liken Genghis Tron‘s return to that of Florida’s Cynic. When that once-death-metal band reemerged in 2008 after some 15 years with a more progressive sound, it felt similarly natural for them to go in that direction as it does for Genghis Tron to go or to have gone in this one. I won’t decry the band’s past work, but to call Dream Weapon anything less than one of the year’s best LPs would be underselling it. It’s not just that they’ve changed their style or gotten more melodic with a new singer — the impact of this material also comes from a creative use of rhythm that might’ve been possible before but certainly wouldn’t have been likely. At the same time, as much as Wolski and Yacyshyn bring to the band — and that’s plenty — the songwriting at work between Jordan and Sochynsky feels very much like the foundation from which the pieces are built out into the whole album. That is a task for which one is thankful they set themselves, and if this is a point from which they might pick up and continue forward, it should be all the more counted as essential.
Posted in Bootleg Theater on February 12th, 2021 by JJ Koczan
In hindsight, it was a pretty quick run, but the reverberations thereof continue to ripple out. It’s hard to describe the sheer joy it was to hear Genghis Tron‘s 2005 Cloak of Love EP when Crucial Blast put it out. It caught my eye because it was recorded by Colin Marston, whose work I knew through Behold… the Arctopus!, and through five songs in not much more than 12 minutes, it turned the idea of only-super-severe grindcore on its head with programmed drums and dance beats amid frenetic guitar and brutal screams. It was heavy, pummeling, and an unashamed good time. I was fortunate enough to see the Poughkeepsie-based then-trio live at the time — I think they were touring with Pig Destroyer? — and already a fan, I was made one again.
Relapse picked them up for their first album, 2006’s Dead Mountain Mouth, and its inevitable follow-up, 2008’s Board Up the House. I remember being somewhat underwhelmed by the debut LP, ultimately. Some of the experimentalism they showed in trying to draw together the two sides of their approach left me cold, and I think maybe my head was just elsewhere. Board Up the House would be their swansong, and the hype for it was massive, which especially at that point was a huge turnoff for me. Maybe the novelty had faded. Whatever it was, I didn’t give the record its due, and with the announcement that founding keyboardist/programmer Michael Sochynsky and founding guitarist/programmer Hamilton Jordan had reformed the band after a decade to release a new album called Dream Weapon (info here) in March — still through Relapse — and especially after listening to the title-track of said comebacker, it was clearly time to break out the 2008 album to see how it’s held up.
Beautifully.
Some 13 years after the fact, I’m not sure extreme music has caught up to Genghis Tron yet, and songs like the opening title-cut and “Things Don’t Look Good,” “I Won’t Come Back Alive,” the intricately-timed “Colony Collapse” and the final run it leads to are nothing short of brilliant, bringing together industrial, grind, technical prowess and sheer ferocity all the while maintaining an unmistakable sonic persona through a variety of moods, tempo changes and periodic excursions into big payoff riffs. If I missed the effect of a song like Cloak of Love‘s “Ride the Steambolt” on the first album, well, “The Feast” accomplishes much the same blend of EDM and grind, while still moving the methodology forward in under two minutes’ runtime. With 11 tracks, it turns blinding ragers and sprinting, slicing precision upside down and barely stops to look back at the faces its melted in the process. “Endless Teeth”‘s sudden departure into dream-glitch. The mini-New Wave dance party set to hip-hop beat in “Recursion.” The foreshadow of slowdown in “City on a Hill” that in itself answers the pre-mosh section of “Things Don’t Look Good.” The use of melodic vocals alongside the screams and barks of then-vocalist Mookie Singerman.
And as almost a separate entity of its own, the final fun — I guess it’s just side B of the 11-song/43-minute offering, but really it’s when “Colony Collapse” picks up from “The Whips Blow Back” — makes Board Up the House all the more worthy of the plaudits heaped on it at the time. Between the industrialized apocalypse of “Colony Collapse,” “The Feast” bringing The Dillinger Escape Plan‘s vocalist Greg Puciato in for a guest spot, the bizarre, bagpipe-esque manipulations of “Ergot” and the 10-minute what-if-Genghis–Tron-but-doom finale of “Relief” — complete with near-harmony on the vocals — it’s no less a dizzying array than Genghis Tron put together throughout the release, but it stands out nonetheless and feels placed on the album specifically to do so. The opening tension of beats and keyboard surges in “Board Up the House,” the song, feel far away despite having occurred only about half an hour ago, and even as “Relief” is indeed a moment to exhale, Genghis Tron still find it in them to shred expectation and create an absolute wash of heavy that’s no less colorful than anything that surrounds.
Simply put, the album is astonishing, and it very much remains that. Genghis Tron have already put word out that Dream Weapon will be different, and the track they chose to stream bears that out. If we’re thinking purely in terms of RelapseRecords bands for comparison, it’s more Torche than The Dillinger Escape Plan, and bringing in new singer Tony Wolski and a live drummer in Nick Yacyshyn, known for his work in Sumac and Baptists.
Inevitably, that change — having a person behind a kit — will be a big one in itself, and from just that first single, Wolski‘s melodic vocals in place of Mookie Singerman‘s off-the-rails screaming as a defining aspect will likewise present a turn. But frankly, fair enough. I’m not the same person I was 13 years ago, or 10, or five. It seems unreasonable to expect Genghis Tron — a band who had the impact they did precisely because they were so god damned forward thinking — to return and pretend like no time has passed whatsoever. I don’t know what their next album will bring — I haven’t heard it yet — but hell’s bells I’m looking forward to finding out.
I know this one is a little outside-genre for what one typically might expect around these parts. Who cares? 12 years later, I’m kind of over not writing about something I’m interested in writing about for whatever reason. If you dig Board Up the House, all the better. If not and you’ve read this far anyway, thanks for reading. If you ignored this post altogether, you’ll probably notice how all lives involved have gone on. That’s about where I’m at.
But really, even on the cusp of Genghis Tron showing a different side of their sound — I wonder if Sochynsky and Jordan felt they’d pushed this as far as it could go here — Board Up the House remains strikingly relevant and brazen in its individuality of purpose. As always, I hope you enjoy, but if you can’t find something here to dig into, it’s pretty much your own loss.
Thanks for reading.
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I had a tooth removed yesterday. I’d never had an extraction before, but following what would be the fourth and final root canal on the back molar — number 30, however those things are counted — I felt like maybe it was time to get rid of the damn thing and have an implant put in. Not like there were any nerves left anyway, and I know that because there was a raging infection in my mouth for the entire plague-addled stretch of 2020 and I only knew it because every now and then I had to drain pus out of a fistula in my gumline. Yes, disgusting.
All the more so because as the oral surgeon — younger than me — unceremoniously yanked the offending number 30 from my mouth, I could smell that same rot and know that there was a hole in the bone of my mouth that needed to be patched up using some collagen and tiny pellets that I can only assume harden like so much Play-Doh over time into a passable facsimile for the piece of missing necrotized skeleton. A childhood of sugary drinks come home to roost. In my defense, I was born before science was invented.
It hurt like a motherfucker. Good luck explaining that to The Pecan, who was like, “Use your jaw to read me Daniel Tiger Chooses to Be Kind while you bleed, fucker!” for the early part of the afternoon. They gave me Tylenol with codeine, to which I was like, “What do I have the sniffles?,” but alas my pharmacist was all business. The good news was there’s a decent leftover amount of Oxycodone around from various procedures, and that it gets thusly hoarded for specific reasons like this. Soon enough I was still in pain but not nearly so bothered by it. The Pecan went down for a nap — which he didn’t actually take, but quiet time in his room is good for everyone — and I read a bit and worked on some other stuff.
Specifically, I’ve decided to bring back The Obelisk Questionnaire and send it around much like the Days of ‘Rona feature last year — actually I suspect I’ll have a lot of the same people answering; my reach is only so far — but I’ll handle sending that out this weekend and hopefully get responses back soon and start posting thereafter. Having people send their own pictures with the Days of ‘Rona thing was the best idea I ever had. I will continue that policy as much as I am able.
Hopefully doing that allows me to give a shout to a bunch of stuff I might not have room for otherwise in a way separate from even the Quarterly Review. I’m just trying to put this outlet to as effective use as possible.
Like all great choices, this decision was made while under the influence of narcotic painkillers. We’ll see how it goes.
Today is The Patient Mrs.’ birthday, and without giving it away, it’s a big one. Happy birthday to the love of my life, whose existence makes not just my life possible, but has a genuine net-positive on the planet, which in my view can be said of maybe three people when all things are factored in. Certainly not something I’d say about myself. In any case, having been together since 1997, I am in continuous and daily awe of the human being who has so generously chosen to spend her life in my company. Thank you, baby. I am fortunate she’s so stubborn in admitting a mistake or I’d have been out on my ass a long time ago.
Years ago, a pact was made that we would buy a boat by… this age that she reaches today, and we got in just under the wire. A used 1985 Somethingorother, complete with trailer. We’re having the trailer hitch put on the car as I write this so we can take the boat up to Connecticut tomorrow ahead of the wintry mix that’s supposed to hit New Jersey on Sunday. It’s not a luxury liner by any stretch, but it’s got a motor, and my understanding is the motor works, and the interior is rad. When The Patient Mrs. first showed it to me, I asked if it had a tape player. We weren’t sure from the pictures, and the thing was winter-wrapped when we actually went to see it, so I’ve still got my fingers crossed.
I would call it impulsive, considering the layoff notice she’s already gotten from her job owing to the pandemic, but hell, sometimes you set a goal and attain it at the expense of both your meager savings and practicality. It’s only an impulse if you don’t count the last 10 years we’ve been talking about it.
Needless to say, I expect one or both of our cars to die at any moment.
If you have a second and care to wish The Patient Mrs. a happy birthday, I know I’d appreciate it and if she has a chance to read this, she might as well. Thanks either way for reading and I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Back on Monday for a whole other bunch of stuff. Don’t forget to hydrate in the meantime.
Posted in Whathaveyou on January 29th, 2021 by JJ Koczan
13 years and a singer and drummer later, Genghis Tron return with a new album. Their last record was 2008’s Board up the House, and they reemerge from hiatus as guitarist Hamilton Jordan and keyboardist Michael Sochynsky are joined by Tony Wolksi and Sumac‘s Nick Yacyshyn on drums. You bet your ass that makes a difference on “Dream Weapon,” the title-track of Genghis Tron‘s impending third long-player, out March 26 in a renewed collaboration with Relapse Records. You’ll hear more vocal melody than I think the band has ever employed in the new track, and yes, live drums to go with what would seem also to be programmed beats. Don’t expect to get a handle on everything happening your first time through. That’s just not how Genghis Tron have ever operated.
For reference, in addition to the video for “Dream Weapon” below — watch out if you’re sensitive to strobe/herky-jerky cuts — I’ve included the Bandcamp stream of Board up the House. Interestingly, their 2006 debut, Dead Mountain Mouth and their 2005 EP, Cloak of Love, don’t seem to be streaming officially anywhere. They’re on YouTube if you’re up for the minimal digging required.
I shared the “Dream Weapon” video on Thee Facebooks the other day, but here’s info from the PR wire:
GENGHIS TRON ANNOUNCE DREAM WEAPON; FIRST NEW FULL-LENGTH IN 13 YEARS
GENGHIS TRON make their return with their highly anticipated new album, Dream Weapon! The band’s first new studio outing in over a decade, GENGHIS TRON’s Hamilton Jordan and Michael Sochynsky are now joined by two new collaborators: vocalist Tony Wolski and Sumac/Baptists drummer Nick Yacyshyn.
Together, the lineup perfects the unique mix of extreme rock and electronic music GENGHIS TRON has pioneered over their storied career. A melding of hypnotic rhythms and densely layered synth soundscapes, Dream Weapon was recorded and produced alongside long-time collaborator Kurt Ballou at God City Studio in Salem, Massachusetts, with additional production and engineering by Ben Chisolm (Chelsea Wolfe) JJ Heath (Rain City Recorders) and was mastered by Heba Kadry.
Watch GENGHIS TRON’s new “Dream Weapon” music video, directed by Mount Emult (Dying Fetus, The Pixies) AT THIS LOCATION.
Dream Weapon is out March 26, 2021 on CD/LP/Digital. Physical pre-orders via Relapse.com are available HERE. Digital Downloads/Streaming are available HERE.
GENGHIS TRON recently reissued their two full-length albums Board Up The House & Dead Mountain Mouth on vinyl for the first time in over 10 years. Orders are available at http://relapse.com/genghis-tron.
Artwork by Trevor Naud
Dream Weapon Tracklist: Exit Perfect Mind Pyrocene Dream Weapon Desert Stairs Alone In The Heart Of The Light Ritual Circle Single Black Point Great Mother
Lyrically and conceptually, Dream Weapon picks up where Board Up The House left off.
“That album’s closing track, ‘Relief,’ was about how humans have become a burden to the planet, and how Earth will endure long after we’re gone,” Hamilton Jordan explains. “There is sadness at the end, but some relief—and beauty—too. Dream Weapon is, loosely, an album-length meditation on that theme.”
From the ethereal, almost robotic vocal phrasings accompanying the industrial attack of “Pyrocene,” to the chaotic, pulse-pounding drumming acrobatics and cyclical guitar patterns in the album’s triumphant title track, Dream Weapon is not just a nod to GENGHIS TRON’s celebrated past as a metal/progressive/experimental outfit. The new album redefines what these genres, sounds, and musical elements can achieve. Dream Weapon is a record that captures GENGHIS TRON at a matured, focused state; the ebbs and flows of the album are just as hard-hitting as they are dreamy, soaring, and meditative.
Seasoned GENGHIS TRON listeners will find Dream Weapon to be both excitingly fresh and reassuringly familiar. “Though it sounds a bit different than our previous albums, I don’t think we approached Dream Weapon any differently than the others,” Jordan explains. “Michael and I take years to write and trade demos, with about 80% of our ideas landing on the cutting-room floor. Once we have a rough song idea we both like, we write dozens of drafts of a song over months before we end up with a final demo.”
“I think one difference in our approach for this album was that we had a strong sense from the outset of what kind of vibe we wanted to create,” Sochynsky adds. “Something more cohesive, meditative and hypnotic.”
Through the album’s inventiveness and rejuvenated approach, Dream Weapon marks another bold step forward in the wildly creative career of GENGHIS TRON, and cements the band’s legacy of groundbreaking, genre-defying innovation.
managed to nail down a 9AM time earlier this week and as I finished off my morning coffee — Jordan noted he’s also an early riser — the two main songwriters in Genghis Tron talked through the process of writing largely pre-pandemic but still remotely, as well as restructuring their band both in personnel and sound. I didn’t get to ask about working with Kurt Ballou after such a long break, but you’ll note that Jordan credits the GodCity producer with making the connection both to Yacyshyn and Wolski, so one way or another, he’s definitely had a significant impact on who and what Genghis Tron are in 2021, and that’s before you get to recording the album. And in any case, I’m sure there are other interviews you can find out there that ask the question what it was like to be back with Ballou with the passing of so much time. I was happy to talk about the building of melodies and songs coming together pieces at a time, the birth of Dream Weapon around what became its de facto centerpiece in “Alone in the Heart of the Light,” and so on.
