Band:	Self-Inflicted Violence
Album:	A Perception Of Matter And Energy
Style:	Black metal, Post rock
Release date:	December 01, 2009
A review by:	Lucas

01. Liquids
02. Artificial Phenomenon
03. Eugenics
04. A Mental Cancer II
05. Comfort In Insomnia
06. Realisation

Self-Inflicted Violence is, and this shouldn't surprise anyone, Depressive Black metal. The current line-up of this British twin-headed monster consists of "1,4,1,13" and "V11". So uhm... yeah... No, wait. Seriously. What the fuck is up with people not being able to think of proper stage names these days? Is 'Necrobutcher' not good enough anymore these days for all you damned hippies? What about 'Blasphemer'? Or 'Dead', for christ's sake. Or damned 'Caller of the Storms' if you must, but V-fucking-11?! What are you trying to say here? Ahum. Depressive Black metal. You hate yourself so you shouldn't really be bothered if I hate you as well, right? Well, I don't really hate you as such, but come on.

It's not my job to judge lyrical content or stagenames though, so no more ranting. A Perception Of Matter And Energy is best described as a poor man's Drudkh in their Forgotten Legends and Autumn Aurora phase. SIV utilizes a lot lot of meandering, droney riffs but wraps them in a stammering and stuttering jacket much too often. Occasionally they flow nicely, but mostly I'm annoyed at how messed up the potentially great riffs are. Sometimes they're badly played, sometimes they're badly produced and sometimes they're badly written.

There's not much to say about the drums or the bass, they were present at the time of recording and played their parts, so let's move on the vocals. They remind me of the guitar riffs in the sense that they are almost very good, but somehow end up being bad. Sometimes they're dodgy, sometimes they're just over-the-top, sometimes they're weak, I don't know what the hell is going on here, but there's always something wrong with the vocals.

A Perception Of Matter And Energy is a strange album. When playing this album I cannot stop thinking that the members fucked it up on purpose. There's always something that annoys me, bothers me or irritates me. And I like to think of myself as a pretty easy-going dude. If stripped of all this annoying bits and bytes it might even be quite good. But who cares, Drudkh and Burzum did it a whole lot better anyway.