Classified | Hand Shakes and Middle Fingers

CD Reviews

Moby | Destroyed

Mute (2011)

By MICHAEL CHRISTOPHER | May 12, 2011

3.0 Stars

This was supposed to be some sort of acoustic jaunt, but Moby reverted to what he does best: sounding like Moby. Unfortunately, it doesn't always work. Destroyed is frontloaded in an incomprehensibly dull manner: lots of vocoder and drum looping spanning tracks that never go anywhere and bleed monotonously into one another. Many won't make it past that, casting the record aside and chalking it up to a really shitty effort by ol' baldy. That'd be a pity, because Mobz does a complete U-turn mid record with "The Day," a heartbreaking lament about watching a loved one suffer through the painful solace of drug addiction. It sets the stage for "After," "Victoria Lucas" (Sylvia Plath's old pen name), and "Blue Moon" — all of them tailor-made for those after-hours clubs where drugs aren't necessary to enjoy the soundtrack (though they wouldn't hurt). The final segment swells atmospherically. "Stella Maris" is a simple but stirring ambient piece that could fit well over the final scenes of any Jim Sheridan film. Ditch the first 20 minutes and open the album with the stunning, nearly seven-minute "The Violent Bear It Away," which is tucked away toward Destroyed's end, and here's a career-defining work.

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