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Mandy, Indiana Album Review: URGH

(Sacred Bones)

BY JORDAN MAINZER

You don't have to speak French to understand the urgency present within URGH, the sophomore album and Sacred Bones debut from Manchester noise rock band Mandy, Indiana. As with their acclaimed debut i've seen a way, Parisian vocalist Valentine Caulfield sings in her native language, a tactic originating from her experience performing opera. The contemporary listener can take in Mandy, Indiana the same way they might opera, following a story of emotional high stakes rather than one comprised of plot or narrative structure. Caulfield and company add physical desperation and bile to the mix. It's hard to listen to URGH without thinking about how she and drummer Alex Macdougall both faced serious health issues during the album's writing and recording; the band channels the exhaustion inherent in struggling with your own body, into URGH's industrial aesthetic. The record sometimes sounds like it's been made by a band not just playing but fighting their instruments that range from human-made objects to sentient machinations.

The feeling of outward antagonism that pervades URGH is no accident. First and foremost, Caulfield publicly directed lead single "Magazine" towards her rapist, an attempt to recover through reclamation of power by saying, "You hurt me, so I'm going to hurt you." Between percussion that clacks below Simon Catling's synth bass and Caulfield's increasingly intense vocals, the song uses bouts of silence to let the counterattack gain strength and fester. The targets of "ist halt so" and "Dodecaheadron" are broader in reach but no less specific, respectively, those perpetrating the genocide in Gaza and, perhaps more frustrating, those who do nothing in the face of global ills. Sirens permeate the former, a sound associated with a "take shelter" warning sign, often perversely employed by imperialist governments telling a population, "We're going to bomb you" before doing exactly that. Mandy, Indiana are unwilling to accept the status quo. On closer "I'll Ask Her", Caulfield embodies the point of view of the nice guy who doesn't want to ruffle any feathers with his bros, whether they're toxic or straight-up rapists. "You wouldn't let him date your sister, but it's different / It's your sister," she states, calling out the absurdity of turning the other way when the victims of violence--sexual or political--are nameless and faceless. Rapper billy woods guests on "Sicko!", shooting similarly acerbic jabs at big pharma, all with his trademark bleakness: "Harm reduction is hiding the body so they can keep hope alive."

What's essential about URGH, though, is that it's an album you can rage to, dance to, cry to, even laugh to, with a sound that's original but kindred in spirit to past experimental breakthroughs. The repeated drum line, garbled vocals, and atonal horn-like synths of "Dodecahedron" recall the warped mechanics of early Battles. The way guitarist/producer Scott Fair and co-producer Daniel Fox (of Gilla Band) weave dialogue through the elements on "try saying" is reminiscent of Jlin's use of Mommie Dearest samples on Dark Energy closer "Abnormal Restriction". Still, URGH is primarily protest music with a beating heart, found in the likes of the buzzing hip hop percussion of "Sevastopol" and the drum grooves of "Cursive", creating kinship with characters fictional (none other than the witches of Andrew Fleming's 1996 cult hit The Craft) and all-too-real, folks beholden to the patriarchy, colonialism, and capitalism. Consider it a useful weapon in the ongoing fracas.