Form Of Rocket, Men

What’s not to like here? Crazy liner notes composed of hand-scrawled lists of the hierarchies of scents and angels (uh, kinda; I’m guessing the Church doesn’t recognize “The Grand Universe Eventuals” as members of the heavenly host), song titles like “Teapot Dome, Bitch” and “You’d Look Cute in the Trunk of My Car,” lengthy, abrasive math-rock song structures, bottom-heavy bass that lurches and thunders as it pulls the whole mess steadily along like a locomotive, scraping, menacing guitars with a layer of grime so thick you can only cut it with a steak knife, and half-strangled/half-yodeled vocals that come off like The Jesus Lizard’s David Yow if he were a NASCAR-watching redneck. Hot damn, Form Of Rocket’s Men is fun — albeit a brutal, rough-edged, dead-end-life kind of fun. The whole thing, all the way from the loud, violent, Fatal Flying Guilloteens-ness of “This Is Occupation” through the slow-stomping rock of “Go Get Your Buck” and the slightly more melodic “Gearth” to album closer “Peter Makowski Had an Aneurysm,” comes off like June of ’44 playing a backyard barbecue somewhere in the far-flung hillbilly sticks after doing a whole lot of desert-biker meth. It’s loud, it’s dissonant, it’s hypnotic, it’s sarcastic-smarty-pants intelligent, and it makes me wish Amphetamine Reptile was still putting out records.