Noise is the New Melody
Mouth to Mouth delivers an abstract sonic molesting;

by Dan Barry - July 27, 2006

You don´t find a whole hell of a lot of noise acts around Connecticut. Around these parts, noise as a musical genre is usually associated with Providence (which has a burgeoning experimental scene in general). So when I heard that a local noise act with the spectacular name of Mouth to Mouth was playing New Haven´s BAR on Sunday night, I decided to take the hike south.
For the unprepared, a noise show can be anywhere from disturbing to downright obnoxious. If the flood of people exiting BAR as I entered was any indication, Mouth to Mouth had permanently alienated a fair number of their initial audience. So, by way of introduction: the proper mindset for listening to noise is probably akin to the way you would listen to classical or jazz (with a dash of death metal, if you actually have that as a point of reference). Yeah, it´s abrasive. Yeah, it´s woefully, indulgently abstract. But noise´s utter formlessness allows it to cut straight to the pith of songwriting. Serenity, tension, and pure primal fear are evoked with breathtaking directness.

So we have Mouth to Mouth: one man on drums, one manning a laptop and a banjo, and one doing ... uh... well, he´s got some pots and pans, and he´s holding what looks like an EKG electrode up to them as he scratches them with rocks and razors and shit.

One piece begins as a staticky drone, only to be riven by a flock of girls screaming in terror as a roller coaster careens off its tracks. (Surely this is the work of our friend with the pan.) Soon afterward, all the frequencies hitherto unoccupied by sound open and fill with white noise. Meanwhile the drummer is hurling his arms and legs into the kit, playing like a jazz musician who doesn´t know he´s been jettisoned into space by the rest of his group.

Horrific in a really exciting way.