Deconstruction 2011

"I love Devin Townsend. I like his music. I like his humor. I especially like it when he combines his humor with his music, as he did so well in Ziltoid, the Omniscient. Unfortunately, I think he really goes WAY over-the-top in about every area imaginable in the production of Deconstruction. I have already reviewed Ghost (which was released at the same time) and lamented how he left the center of his typical musical universe to explore the extreme edges. Ghost was too soft. Deconstruction is too...well, everything. You name it, Deconstruction has too much of it.

Townsend loves to create a wall of sound, but with this album he has created walls upon walls of sounds and the overall effect is ultimately more distracting (assaulting is the better word) than pleasing to my ears.

The album starts off quite nicely with the opening moments of "Praise the Lowered" which steadily increases in intensity and volume to become somewhat of a frothing mess which is a precursor of things to come.

"Stand" follows and is a great track, right in the wheelhouse for what makes Devin such a great artist. It is heavy, with lots of layered guitar parts providing unique sounds in conjunction with Devin's vocal arrangements. However, the sonic assault has yet to truly begin. "Juular" is reminiscent of the "Vampolka"-"Vampira" combo from Synchestra. It comes fast and furious and it is becoming apparent that Townsend is throwing more and more into the mix.

"Planet of the Apes" is next and starts out well enough with a heavy off-beat groove. The drums and samples are a bit annoying here though as everything sounds way too programmed. I do enjoy the change of pace though that this song goes through especially around the 6-minute mark. Devin's vocals are great though in this song, especially when he is not screaming.

"Sumeria" continues the heavy programming sound which I don't care for and the walls of sound begin to grate on me even though there are some nice musical moments here. But this is about where Devin loses me on this album. "The Mighty Masturbator" is the next song and it starts innocently enough, but with a title like that you know the opening soft, acoustic sounds are momentary. Between "Masturbator", "Pandemic" and "Deconstruction", there is just too much silliness and loud loudness to the point where everything just feels overbearing.

Devin will be Devin. Walls of sound, passing gas, references to both male and female sex organs are in full supply on this album. It's just too much for me. I'm so worn out after listening to this album that Ghost all of a sudden seems like a welcome change."