iForward, Russia!
Life Processes
(Cooking Vinyl)
It's not just their typographer's nightmare of a name that catapulted iForward, Russia! to the forefront of the British indie scene when they released their debut two years ago. The group issued Give Me a Wall on their guitarist's small label, and their dark, fierce anthems were made unique by scratchy, slapdash production set alight by a wall of guitars, a ceaseless torrent of cymbal-heavy drumming, and singer Tom Woodhead screeching.
And now the Leeds quartet returns with Life Processes, and their first record on an established label offers as taut a musical experience as their previous outing. The band's notion of mixing post-punk urgency with cinematic post-rock comes across as fresh and relevant.
God is thrown into the mix, too, with biblical references throughout. There are confusing moments of divine empowerment ('Tonight God Is angry/ we can roll with the punches' from Welcome to the Moment) and redemption on the day of reckoning ('Ashes to ashes, dust to dust/ Jesus Christ and Lazarus' in Some Buildings).