It’s October, 2009, and there’s a new album out by The Black Heart Procession.  It’s called Six, and I swear that when I started writing this review I felt nothing but positive vibes towards everyone involved.  Wikipedia tells me that Six is “long-awaited,” which seems reasonable considering that the San Diego band’s last album dropped 3 long years ago.  It’s also entirely possible that The Black Heart Procession has fans who await each new release with baited breath, though I admit I’ve never been one of them.  In fact, I was drawn to this album by the quality of its single, Rats, and thought Six might also be a nice shift from last week’s Broadcast post, in that The Black Heart Procession seem to have retained at least a cursory interest in the concept of songwriting. 

Having listened now to Six in full, I wish I’d left the album well enough alone.  Like Health, The Black Heart Procession has crafted one dark, strangely sexy track that features a rubbery, top-of-the-mix bass line; Rats sounds vaguely like something Six Finger Satellite or Girls Against Boys might have recorded in their prime (the latter, possibly, as New Wet Kojak) and it leaves the rest of the album in the dust.  As you might guess, Rats is currently the only song streaming on the band’s website. 

Taken as a whole, Six sounds about as tired as the band looks in its official photo, seemingly shot after a rough week at Burning Man.  I’ve never exactly thought of The Black Heart Procession as a subtle band–with their name, how subtle can they be–but in my memory, they at least embraced a fairly original form of doom and gloom, coupling Rain-Dog-Era Tom Waits sea shanties with a Pinetop Seven sense of cinematic narrative.  Two well-executed examples of this formula are A Heart Like Mine and It’s a Crime I Never Told You About the Diamonds In Your Eyes, both of which are perfectly competent, piano-driven, steampunk tearjerkers written earlier in the band’s career.

So really, how about the other 12 tracks?  Frankly, they most closely resemble an early, bludgeon-you-over-the-head Calexico, coupled with the most melodramatically world-weary vocals that the Walkmen could ever potentially muster.  If you had to deliver these lyrics, you’d be world-weary as well: journeying to hell in a whiskey bottle and doing drugs with a Nick Cave devil, taking in a medieval circus along the way.  “I’m not leaving til I tear out your heart/I’m not leaving til the devil is dead”?  While a Hammond organ plays in the background?  No thank you. 

I’m posting a link to the catchiest of the non-Rats tracks, Forget My Heart, below.  If you can dissasociate the hook from that terrible Fastball song, you’ll have an alright time.  Honestly, please do enjoy Rats, Forget My Heart, and the two earlier tracks I mentioned above.  Treat them as punchy rewards for not hearing the full album, and as a break for the times when you don’t feel like struggling with that new Broadcast.

• A Heart Like MineA Heart Like Mine
• It’s a Crime I Never Told You About the Diamonds In Your EyesIt’s a Crime I Never Told You About the Diamonds In Your Eyes
• Forget My HeartForget My Heart
• RatsRats