There are only a handful of albums that I think qualify as genuinely scary. You Won’t Get What You Want by Daughters, and Swans To Be Kind both immediately come to mind. But those records come with… let’s say, baggage. I’ve Seen All I Need to See lacks some of the atmospheric spookiness of To Be Kind and the flashes of pop-tinged menace of You Won’t Get What You Want, but it makes up for that with unrelenting brutality. It’s not the soundtrack to a slasher film, it’s the most violent scene in the bleakest horror film, rendered as blown-out drums and detuned guitar.
The album opens with a reading of Douglas Dunn’s The Kaleidoscope, a poem about being trapped in a cycle of grief, as sparse drums boom arhythmically alongside bursts of noise and a low metallic drone. As it transitions into the distant shriek of vocalist / guitarist Chip King, “A Lament” sputters in fits and starts as it struggles to take flight.
Good art is not necessarily pleasant art.
That sets the tone for the record, which is less a collection of songs and more a relentless monolith erected in tribute to the power of distortion. And this is where I admit, I’ve Seen All I Need to See won’t be for everyone. It’s largely atonal, tracks can blend into each other, and even when the drums pick the pace up beyond funeral dirge, the songs feel weighed down, like the band is trying to play their way out of a bog.
That’s not to say there aren’t moments of catharsis to be found. The City is Shelled in particular, erupts towards its back end as King’s vocals become a Goblin-esque croak over pounding piano chords, delivering one of the few moments of genuine melodicism (even if it’s buried under a skyscraper of fuzz).
Even though it’s only 38 minutes long, at times, I’ve Seen All I Need to See can feel like an endurance exercise. But, like a marathon, that doesn’t mean it’s not worth enduring. There is beauty in its brutality. It’s haunting and vicious in the way that, say, Bring Her Back is. Good art is not necessarily pleasant art.
If you’re looking for a record that conjures horror movie vibes without devolving into camp. Something that feels genuinely dangerous and frightening, and not just merely kind of spooky, The Body’s I’ve Seen All I Need to See is what you’re looking for. The record is available on Bandcamp and most streaming services, including Apple Music, Tidal, Deezer, YouTube Music, and Spotify.
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