Remote Viewing: Modern Addictions

Big riffs are never far away from our orbit, and 2023’s first call to arms in this space comes from London underground supergroup, Remote Viewing.

Consisting of vocalist Ed Dudley, bassist John Atkins, guitarists James Bryant and Tom Fowler, and drummer Greg Allum, Remote Viewing isn’t this collective’s first rodeo; each member boasting a worthy C.V. in the U.K. underground, including Palehorse, Million Dead, Sly & The Family Drone, Nitkowski and Wound. With Modern Addictions, the band’s latest release, in many ways it’s a combination of the chaos each band member captures throughout the aforementioned projects.

Recorded at Bear Bites Horse by Wayne Adams (Kulk, Petbrick, Why Patterns, Big Lad) with Liverpool’s Stephen Kerrison (Olanza, Puzzle) beyond the console on mastering duties – a pair that are beginning to form their own tsunami – they put Remote Viewing in good stead to unleash the kind earth-scorching fury that is ripe for these times. Six pot shots bursting through the echo chamber of popular culture and fictitious, look-at-me online grandstanding; something that has become a new perverse narrative of keeping up with the Joneses.

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Just look at the song titles. Black comedy veiled in contempt, and the first cab off the rank is Short Distance Runner. A song with sludge chug and Semtex riff-a-rolla. Essentially this is where noise rock and metal collide, and Remote Viewing execute this new twisted hybridisation with aplomb.

On Wasted On Purpose  Dudley’s vocals rip and tear like being pulled apart by a pack of hyenas. His voice pierces, roars and catapults from the speakers. Later on, the temperature is cranked up even further with Your Opinion Is Wrong.

Cleveland Balloonfest ’86 is pretty much a dust up between Killdozer and The Jesus Lizard while Steve Albini looks on from the other end of the bar. It’s not pastiche, though. With their own primal bludgeoning and a steady diet of Rocket Recordings on the turntable platter, this is something tailor-made for now. Remote Viewing make sure it’s no fluke, either, giving us another dose of hell with Watch Me for the Changes.

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Closing it out with more provocative behaviour, A.B.B.A. / ABBA is perhaps Modern Addictions’ finest moment. “One more time/ For the time we lost’ sings Dudley amid a torrent of groaning guitars and ball tearing bass and percussion that will have Chat Pile fans slavering from the chops.

The crossover capability that Remote Viewing create with Modern Addictions is their greatest feat. Noise-rock and post-hardcore fans will find as much throughout these songs as the beardos and metal heads. It’s a rainbow coalition of sounds from the precipice, and given the malaise continuing to envelope the U.K., with their impeccable timing Remote Viewing emerge from it defiantly. And in doing so, they just about pull us from it, too.

Modern Addictions is out now via Human Worth. Purchase from Bandcamp.