Systems Failure by Toxic Church (Review)

A couple years ago, Toxic Church contributed a track called “Pharmakeia” to the excellent Slava compilation, Voice of the People. When the label that handled that project, Blonde Vinyl, went under, so did many of the bands involved with them. Fortunately, Toxic Church has recovered from that whole mess and has resurfaced with a full-length CD, Systems Failure.

Released on their own label now, MTF Records, Systems Failure falls soundly into the techno-industrial category. Comparisons to older Skinny Puppy and Front 242 as well as to Deitiphobia have been made. They make very generous use of samples, but they’re repeated so many times that they tend to get somewhat monotonous. The vocals are heavily distorted and quite good… I think. Usually, they’re buried so far under everything else that, unless you’re concentrating, you miss them entirely. It’s too bad, too, because there are some really interesting topics addressed here.

There are no real ups and downs — the quality is fairly consistent from track 1 to 12. However, a few of my favorites are “Pharmakeia” (still), “First World Monkey,” “Dunamis,” and “Martyr’s Revenge.” The only real disappointment came with the guitar-heavy “The Keeper.”

A good debut effort, but it could’ve been polished up a little more. Give them a little time…

Written by Carson Pierce. This review originally appeared on the Flaming Fish Music website.