The Faint fill a unique niche in the music scene today, as they balance precariously between the indie, industrial, and punk genres, falling into a category I simply label "electronic rock." While their last album, the highly successful Danse Macabre, was mostly dark, danceable synthrock, Wet From Birth has a greater variety of styles that show the band exploring more original and inventive uses of sound design and texture. While The Faint are not yet as adept with their programming as, say, Frontline Assembly or Haujobb, at the core of every track on this album is solid rock songwriting, which usually makes up for their lack of synth mastery.
Wet From Birth begins with a dramatic violin flourish on "Desperate Guys" which is somewhat of a foreshadowing for the rest of the album, as The Faint have ingeniously added strings and other orchestral instruments to enhance their sound. Todd Baechle's vocals are detached yet intriguing on "How Could I Forget" and the laid-back dub-influenced groove of "Phone Call." Think robotic, but a robot that somehow can show emotional depth. The standout tracks on Wet From Birth are "Drop Kick the Punks" with angular guitars straight out of Trans Am, a frenetic pace, and a riotous German countdown to kick things off, and "Symptom Finger," an insatiable piece of garage EBM with a fabulous vocoded chorus that would feel right at home on the dancefloor.
After listening to this album it seems certain that the Faint are evolving quickly, and I'm excited to see what they'll do next. And although they have been called a retro act by many journalists, they seem to be about progression as opposed to regression, throwbacks, or rehashing. The Faint prove on Wet From Birth that they are, at the very least, retro-modernists.
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