Review: Nega - quadrangle

It's been the first update in quite a while and I'd have to blame this one on my health, which has taken a recent nosedive with my sudden change in location. I really haven't been coherent enough to write a good quality review and I started this one a few days before I fell sick so Nega gets the privilege of being the first of September only because they've got a head start over 13's Reborn, which I still don't feel like doing.

I'll do the cover and other things later if I feel like it. Since I was so sick, I decided instead of typing up lots of random reviews and trying to look "active" I'd come up with a new way of listening to music and forging my reviews. Focusing more on the technical side becomes difficult when the instruments come together to work as one instead of working as several different entities working in concert. So, we'll start with the quadrangle single which happens to be one of those singles that would challenge how I think about music in more ways than one.

Even though I'm changing my approach toward how I look at music objectively, I still find that the beginning washed-out chorus section was a poor-choice when it isn't accompanied with the music video. The cut on the hole EP was better since it jumped right into the song and the dark atmosphere isn't ruined by the beginning cheesiness. Other than the hard and the soft parts coming one after another to create a feeling of chaos and then slow tension rising into the chorus, there isn't any other part to quadrangle that stands out like a sore thumb. What draws me into this song the most is that Nega plays hard and balances it with the soft well and it doesn't sound like they are forcing the atmosphere. It's possibly one of their better songs.

Mu is one rollercoaster of a track and is constructed in a pattern similar to about 95% of Nega's other songs: there's one cool riff I like and the rest of the song that I could care less about. It starts off like a rocket and then the pace of the track slows at an increasing pace until it reaches a point of brief, hard passages marked with quiet sections. With Mu, there is no guessing what direction Nega is going to go in next because it comes off as if they didn't know where they wanted to go with it exactly so they stuck a few parts together and created this. If they smoothed out some of the segueing (for example, from the screaming to the chorus the first time around) it would be a chameleon but Mu misses that subtle magic by a few inches. There's also some parts where Jin's voice is altered and the soundscape is mixed between flying over a demented circus and some church bells. This song also dips into insanity with some effects placed in the middle which I guess is supposed to straddle the line between solo and breakdown and just continues in the trend of being an unpredictable beast. There are too many pauses and not enough smooth transitions and it is a melting pot of different ideas that wasn't cooked long enough.

introvert reminds me quite a lot of Burzum's Tomhet in theory and placement. It's function is to wind you down after Mu and form a feeling of closed, closeted anger and tension mixed in with random outbursts of insanity. The constant and haunting drum patterns work well at the beginning of the song but the electronic buildup of the effects steals it's thunder as the track goes on. The ending of this track also feels incomplete, as if the song could have gone on for a few seconds longer and faded out. A fade-out would have been the best course of action for this track to take and a sudden cutoff ruins the effect the song was giving off. The title track suggests just what the song does: it doesn't try to stand out and push the limits of this single. It stays forgettable, dark, pretty stable, and at the end of the day won't immediately grab your attention.

So that's the ride through quadrangle for you. It's a pretty good single but the only song I would recommend you download is readily available on the hole EP so that's where I would direct my attention to. Mu is worth a try if you're into Nega when they're being sonically schizophrenic and introvert is a good SE if you're in the mood for it. Fans of Nega already know they like this but newcomers to Nega should look elsewhere.