Record Reviews
Mercy
By René Schaefer
Deaf Wish is dead. Long live Deaf Wish, writes RENÉ SCHAEFER.
[Historical image is withheld pending rights review.] Like Schrödinger’s famous feline, nobody can determine with any certainty whether Deaf Wish are alive or dead at any given time. The band formed in 2007, played a handful of semi-legendary shows, released a stunning self-titled debut, and promptly disbanded when guitarist and vocalist Sarah Hardiman jetted off to travel and live in Europe indefinitely.
Mindful of the unfulfilled promise of their initial burst of creativity, Deaf Wish eventually recruited guitarist Pete Dickinson to fill Hardiman’s shoes, and thus began a period of relative stability for the band, which cemented their reputation as one of Melbourne’s fiercest, most unhinged and chaotic live acts. This era was documented on the LP Reality & Visions (2009); a sprawling shambles of an album, which nonetheless brimmed with a myriad of roughly sketched ideas, impulsive tangents and indie rock deconstructions.
In typical Deaf Wish fashion, the band called it quits again immediately following the launch of the album, when bassist Nick Pratt decided to move to Perth to be with his wife. In some sort of quantum paradox, the group found time before his departure to write and record album number three. To multiply the confusion, Mercy features the original line-up, with Hardiman back on board due to the fortuitous timing of a brief home town visit.
So, while the band might be dead, this record is indeed alive – and very much so. Most importantly, it manages to combine all the elements that were present on their previous releases into one snarling monster. Whereas the first album highlighted individual group members’ songwriting talents, and the second one was a noisy clusterfuck of epic proportions, Mercy is a kinetic collision of all these elements.
Hardiman’s contribution, both vocally and as guitarist, is crucial to this artistic triumph. More than ever, Deaf Wish walk the tightrope between melody and noise, structure and pure bedlam. ‘The Beat Of Nothing’s Wrong’ starts with Hardiman and guitarist Jensen Tjhung duetting sweetly, before exploding in a stratospheric burst of guitar noise. This tension between restraint and violence continues with ‘The Line Between Us’, which see-saws between quiet whispering and raw-throated rage.
“Having created this diamond in the rough, Deaf Wish throw it out into the world with little regard as to where it lands.”
And the rockers keep on coming, each song more frenzied and filled with treble-kicking guitar and splatterhead drumming than the last. With five songs clocking in at under two minutes, it’s a speedy rollercoaster ride at times, but there are moments of relief where the pace dips down for songs such as the slow-burning ‘The Way It is’. It’s the album’s centerpiece and most focused and sustained workout; guitars soar over a plodding floor-tom beat, before being steamrolled by Pratt’s livid outburst on ‘Hate You’.
Song titles like ‘Get On The Plane’ and ‘Disappear’ hint at the emotions that went into producing this spontaneous, yet somehow immaculately realised collection of songs. This is the sound of a band tearing itself apart, but with an urgent need to keep creating together. There is an emotional honesty in every chord, every whisper, every declaration of love, every defiant scream of rage. There is no artifice or posturing on Mercy, not a single gratuitous note or pedestrian chord. Everything is exactly as it is meant to be, in all its raw glory.
Having created this diamond in the rough, Deaf Wish throw it out into the world with little regard as to where it lands. This record won’t feature in too many end-of-year lists, and who knows whether they will ever perform it live, but it’s a testament to the power that great rock music can still have, even in this day and age. As Roy Orbison once growled in his best tomcat baritone: “Mercy!”
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