As album-opening moments go, the first two songs on Wolf Eyes' Burned Mind couldn't be more uninviting: After a rotten blast of static and high-frequency hiss in "Dead In A Boat," the appropriately named "Stabbed In The Face" limps into a dense mess of corroded screams, curdling feedback, and synth phases primed to make speakers wave a white flag.
It's bracing, to say the least, but it's also standard-issue noise for Wolf Eyes, a Michigan band that stomps through the rock underground with hyper-loud shows full of frantic fist-pumping and messianic stage moves. Wolf Eyes' music makes sense on the tapes and vinyl records traded through the mail by self-abrading noise fetishists, but it's sure to confuse those won over by Sub Pop labelmates like The Shins and Iron & Wine. However antagonistic it sounds in its higher-stakes context, however, Burned Mind showcases a band in full command of its operation.
After establishing its grim M.O., the album settles into a mesmerizing set that scours the edge it leaps over so unhaltingly. Tracks like "Reaper's Gong" slink through quiet spells of repentance, but explosive shrieks remain a knob-twitch away. In "Village Oblivia," the group thrashes through a sludgy puddle of head-rush blood, plying its bastardized electronic consoles like a death-metal band knocked back on cough syrup. Ominous trickles do well by the titles of tracks like "Urine Burn" and "Rattlesnake Shake," the former of which trails a blur of processed vocal howls. It's hard to divine what the voice might be saying, but catharsis and clarity rarely commingle in Wolf Eyes' massed mind.