The Ruiner, third album by New York Noise rock band Made out of Babies is a weird little album. The band has been around for a while now with this being their third album and first for The End Records. There was a fair bit of hype on the internet leading to this albums release and having never heard them before, the name itself was more than enough for me to check them out.

The album starts with the jagged and noisy Cooker with vocalist Julie Christmas going completely berserk. The music right through the album is superb. The guitarist plays these jagged angular riffs that are somewhere between The Jesus Lizard and At The Drive In while the rhythm section holds down these songs with some remarkably tight playing which at times almost seems at cross purposes with the song but manages to come across as very cohesive.

Stand out tracks include the superb mid tempo The Major with its haunting guitar lines and Isis meets emo sound. Elsewhere on the album Bunny Boots manages to shock with its driving rhythm and all out aggressive vocal attack from Julie Christmas before settling down into a martial beat with Christmas doing a deranged Mike Patton impersonation. Invisible Ink is probably the most accessible song on the album and Julie Christmas throws in her most retrained vocal performance although that isn’t really saying much.  Stranger is the longest song on the album and is another scorcher. Mixing up slowed down softer parts with some noisy riffing, this song shows off the dynamics in the music and works really well.

Made Out of Babies sounds like a band that is influenced by a wide variety of music. Imagine a band that’s somewhere between The Melvins, Isis, The Jesus Lizard and latter day Thought Industry. If more than two of those bands rock your boat then chances are you’ll find something to like in The Ruiner. However, I have to say that Julie Christmas’s vocals are very much an acquired taste. She’s like a cross between Karen Cryses of Crisis, Cedric of The Mars Volta and the likes of alt pop-vocalists like Tori Amos and Bjork. It’s more than a handful and she’s completely unique in her delivery but there are times when her voice distracts. She’s very high in the mix and more often than not overpowers the music with her vocal histrionics. It’s a bit of a pity because Made Out of Babies are a talented set of musicians and the songs on The Ruiner are of a consistently high quality.

Still, the vocals do grow on you over time and repeat listens but I think if the band manages to rein in their vocalist next time around, Made Out of Babies could be onto a real winner. Having said that though, The Ruiner is still pretty kick ass.



Label - The End Records
Year of Release - 2008