I followed Azalia Snail's discography from 1993 to 1996, with the albums "Burnt sienna" (1992), "Fumarole Rising" (1993) and "Blue Danube" (1995) and my interest dropped with the album "Escape Maker" (1996) for no reason specific to her, mostly a question of style, as she was even called "Queen of lo-fi", 1996 was marked for me with the discovery of the emocore / post-hardcore / math-rock scene, the lo-fi approach immediately seemed less attractive.I kept an eye on her later discography but without listening to it with attention and care and it is now, 15 years after having abandoned her, that I return with this new, eleventh, album released on Silber records.
Surprisingly nothing really changed, of course she moved from the 4-track recorder to a more digital, cleaner approach, but it is the same kind of songs, the same type of psychedelic obsessional melodies and always with a same renewed freshness.
She was unique in 1992, she is still impossible to classify in 2011 and able to write and record songs peculiar and unusual with a real melodic and emotional impact, "User System" is one of these, even if yes, it sounds strongly along 90's archetypes, but as she was and is still an icon of these times, this is her identity.
As before, and also very typical for her discography, you need to be in an an altered state of consciousness to really enjoy her music but this is also a secondary effect of her music to feel like that, progressively spaced out.
Maybe one of the reasons I was tempted to explore this new album is the "Mantic" record by Lady Lazarus which I discovered a few weeks ago and which can be seen as a real aesthetic heir of Azalia Snail.
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