Le Mal [LP]

FET. NAT creates a bombastic mix of left-field punk, free jazz, trip-hop and precise noise. The Hull, Quebec four-piece is built up of Olivier Fairfield on drums, Pierre-Luc Clement on guitars, Linsey Wellman on saxophone, and punctuated by the nihilistic franglais poetics of vocalist JFNO. His lyrical outbursts evoke the absurdist humour of American Wrestling and kung fu movies, while carrying forward the torch of the Rock In Opposition movement. Known for fiery live performances lifted by the foursome's theatrical stage antics, FET. NAT transcends language and province, reorganizing overlapping nations into a carnival of levitating and confounding grooves. Le Mal, the band's first full-length album since 2014's Poule mange poule, turns concept on it's head as FET. NAT submerges in it's own upside-downside-up world. An illusory mirror image of itself, Le Mal is comprised of five pieces on one side and MIDI interpretations of the same pieces on the flip. The result is a full-player record of discernible variety, with JFNO's warped poetics telling two same-but-different tales underscored by instrumentals of startling restraint, with hushed, menacing polyrhythms and a dire sense of elation lurking beneath. Le Mal shows a band of seemingly limitless connectivity revelling in the unsettling murkiness of machines.