I have and enjoy all three Pale Angels albums, but if you asked me to put them in the order they were released, I'd struggle; if you played me a song from any of them, I wouldn't be able to tell you which album it's from. This isn't a criticism, in fact their consistency and dedication to a grunge-level of opacity within their music is one of their charms and the reason I got into them (the story of which you can read here).
As part of my Specialist Subject Records subscription, this record arrived when it was released in April 2015. I'd only got their first album at the end of 2014, which probably doesn't help my confusion between the two - I was getting into both at a fairly similar time (I have no excuse for the third then, which came out a year-and-a-half later). It was one of the many records I would have bought anyway, had I not got the subscription.
I often write about my favourite tracks from an album, but these guys are about the whole, not the single, and I love the wall of fuzz and mostly unintelligible lyrics. There's a really heavy one on the second side that I really like (Sinking Shadows maybe, or Piss Water - it's very hard to count tracks on a clear vinyl). The doomy one at the end is great too.
When I was about 13 I borrowed a copy of Bleach from the library and recorded it onto a knackered cassette - that album has always been characterised by those first listens on a muddy-sounding cassette with no track-listing and little idea of what was going on; for me, that was always what grunge was about. As I mentioned last time, seeing Pale Angels for the first time felt like I was in a time-warp to early-90's Seattle and I loved their unashamed grunge. They probably hate being compared to Nirvana and grunge in general, but this album reminds me of my confused early attempts to listen to Bleach, and that's a good thing.
Format: 12", insert
Tracks: 10
Cost: £10 new
Bought: Specialist Subject Records
When: 26/03/15
Colour: Clear
Etching: none
mp3s: Download code
