Review Summary: Grimly nihilistic metalcore designed for those who enjoy uncomfortable listening.
Born Under Saturn’s career proved to be short and sweet, leaving in its wake two seven-inches, one full length album and a smattering of disappointment within their admittedly miniscule fan base. Looking back, it’s hardly surprising that they achieved so little commercial success: metalcore was hardly lighting up the airwaves at the very beginning of the new millennium and Born Under Saturn’s particularly dissonant take on the genre hardly seemed designed to garner legions of fans; in fact it seemed designed to give people nightmares. While nowhere near as chaotic as the seminal
Calculating Infinity, which preceded it by a year,
Reflecting the Beautiful Design provides a uniquely visceral,
nasty experience which acts as the aural equivalent of a good old fashioned shanking in a piss soaked alley. Where The Dillinger Escape Plan’s maniacal complexity, poisoned as it is with rage and frustration, seems to draw people in with its frantic technicality and moments of sheer evil quirkiness, Born Under Saturn’s deliberately muddy technicality leaves the listener almost begging for something that resembles a melody.
Now, back in the year 2000 computers were still steam-driven affairs and downloading a single song was at least an hour long marathon which would often end in failure; as such I acquired a shiny hard copy of this record which came with a full set of lyrics in the cd sleeve. I tell you this because the likelihood of obtaining a set of lyrics from the internet is unbelievably slim at best, and I want to assure you that it would be pointless in any case, as the lyrics are as impenetrable as they come. While some bands welcome listeners in to their records and gladly provoke interpretation, Born Under Saturn make it fairly obvious that they don’t care if you live or die, let alone understand what the hell they are going on about. This is one of the things that made them so great; their wilful unfriendliness and intolerable hatred is as refreshing as it is bitter. And you better believe that they’re bitter. The vocalist sounds like a vicious, metalcore cousin to Steve Austin’s visceral growls in Today is the Day; occasionally he slips into brief moments of speech but quickly resumes tearing at the fabric of his own throat, to delightful effect. Whatever he’s screaming about, he obviously means it.
The music is busy, technical and consistently atonal, with rough guitar lines and clattering drums painting a dirty backdrop for jagged, often senseless riffs. On the rare occasions when the music veers near a melody, the band retighten their grip and drag it back to the hideous little world its trying to escape from. Many metalcore bands use the medium to preach a cause, or to decry personal issues they face in their own lives, but Born Under Saturn manage to sound as if they are comprised of hate, and their primary cause seems to be a quest to make people understand that hope isn’t just gone, it never existed at all. If they honestly believed that this record reflected anything to do with beauty then it might be worth hoping that they are locked up somewhere that has rubber walls, because the world isn’t ready for what these guys think is ugly. For any fan of extreme music, though, this ugly little bastard might be just what you’re looking for.
I think it's on last fm, pretty surprisingly.
