Six Finger Satellite

Rhode Island quintet Six Finger Satellite emerged in 1992 with a self-titled EP (for SubPop), which drew attention for the bizarre arrangements of Weapon and Niponese National Anthem and for the free “noise-rock” of Satchmo.

Noise and chaos are certainly the fundamental elements of the album The Pigeon Is The Most Popular Bird (SubPop, 1993). Played in the spirit of an innocent Dadaism that suddenly explodes into atrocious and wild deliriums, with a fondness for erratic rhythms and out-of-tune sounds, the album is elevated by singer Jeremiah Ryan, performing as an overexcited profane preacher who narrates parables of defeat and humiliation, which in fact hide a subtle analytical cruelty. His neurotic lyrics seem to fuse Freud, Sartre, and Bukowski into a single stream of consciousness.
The guitarists John McLean and Peter Phillips, for their part, engage in formidable duels, in which their modest skill is complemented by a gift for syncopation. It is not surprising that much of the credit ultimately falls on the rhythm section of Rick Pelletier (drums) and Kurt Niemand (bass), entrusted with guiding the harmony.
Home For The Holy Day opens with abrasive funk, but the immense ballet of Laughing Larry, with its whirlwind of detuned guitars, makes it clear that this is funk filtered through Birthday Party, Fall, and especially Contortions, while Deadpan colors it with a sense of total alienation bordering on suicidal depression reminiscent of P.I.L. The brutal minimalisms à la Sonic Youth in Love, the swinging nightmare à la Lounge Lizards of Takes On To Know One, and especially the tense macabre dance of Neuro-Harmonic Conspiracy (perhaps the masterpiece) leave no doubt about their vocation to build obsessively expressionist atmospheres.
Always shouted, always frantic, always ungraceful in all its parts, 6FS’s music is in reality a summa of all the “lexical” inventions of rock avant-garde, from “no wave” to industrial music. In the end, one can still find moments of “comedy” amid the chaos: the dizzying, pow-wow-like Funny Like A Clown, the Captain Beefheart-style R&B mayhem of Hi-Lo Jerk (another high point), and the parody of Save The Last Dance For Larry; but these are always grim smiles, comedies that exploit the misfortunes of the hapless.
“Livening up” the whole are the instrumental interludes that separate one track from the next, inspired equally by John Cage, Throbbing Gristle, Half Japanese, and Metal Machine Music (Lou Reed’s unlistenable album); culminating in the fifteen-minute jam that closes the work, a concentrated mass of sound effects and insane distortions worthy of a two-year-old entering a recording studio for the first time.

Then came the surprise release of a (monotonous) electronic mini-album, Machine Cuisine (SubPop, 1994), entirely devoted to electronic pastiches in a style halfway between Kraftwerk and Residents. Magic Bus and Greek Arts were the aspiring synthpop hits, while The Well-Tempered Monkey was the most ambitious track. White Temples was the most industrial showpiece.

So sophisticated that they even cited Jacques Derrida among their influences, 6FS operate on multiple levels of interpretation, from the metalinguistic—appropriating stylistic traits from many different genres—to the psychodramatic, staging strongly grotesque sketches. As Ryan stated: “We don’t write music, we are written by music.”

Severe Exposure (SubPop, 1995) manages to fuse the style of the first album with that of the second, achieving a unique middle ground. After a few seconds of buildup, the music explodes with a distorted riff and a tank-like cadence à la Chrome (Bad Comrade), and from there on the album is driven by relentless grooves. The atmosphere becomes even more new wave with the hiccuping bursts and synthesizer gags of Parlour Games. White Queen To Black Knight borrows the riff from Cream’s Sunshine Of Your Love and leads into Pulling A Train, the emotional peak of the record, detonated by a terrifying drum roll and electrifying voltage. The disordered chaos of Simian Fever, set to wild techno rhythms, even features barks worthy of David Yow. Ryan’s Moog dazzles as it hasn’t since the days of Ravenstine (Pere Ubu) and even colors a novelty track like Cock Fight, which blends a slightly retro instrumental overture (Todd Rundgren?) with an equally anachronistic rock and roll finale reminiscent of 1960s Residents parody. The work culminates with the grand finale of Board The Bus, drawing on the glorious Martian war dances of Chrome.
6FS thus pick up the story where Devo left off, presenting themselves as the Big Black of the techno era.

Paranormalized (SubPop, 1996), however, disappoints, lacking the visceral punch and quirky genius of its predecessor, though its core elements remain: Ryan’s mischievous Moog, John MacLean’s electronic keyboards (who doesn’t always remember he’s the band’s guitarist). Supporting the album are two wild and irreverent voodoobilly tracks, 30 Lashes and White Shadow. Moments of tension and violence (namely The Greatest Hit and Padded Room) are masked by absurd sketches where epileptic rhythms meet grotesque riffs, in the tradition of Devo (Do The Suicide above all), culminating in full-on space cabaret with Coke And Mirrors and in Brechtian theatrics with Slave Traitor. There remains that skewed and jagged quality that has become part of the band’s motto, but the excesses of the previous album have been prudently set aside in favor of a more thoughtful, intellectual format, still offering plenty for those wishing to escape the formulaic.

The Moog-driven alienation of these albums reaches its peak on Law Of Ruins (SubPop, 1998), the epitome of post-industrial rock noir. The quartet still gets overexcited during arrangements, often leaving a sense of messy, unresolved sound. Race Against Space chaotically blends punk rock, acid rock, and industrial rock. The instrumental Fall To Pieces even ventures into ambient music and jazz-rock. Sea Of Tranquillity (twelve minutes) alternates a space-rock-style instrumental jam reminiscent of Hawkwind with a dadaist coda of electronic noise. MacLean and Ryan perhaps attempt to cram too many forms into their songs.
It is no coincidence that the rock and roll tracks are the most gripping. The band convinces most when tackling the grunge of Surveillance House (a cross between Led Zeppelin’s How Many More Times and U2’s Desire), or in their numerous reinterpretations of Stooges and Hendrix, from the out-of-tune riffs of Bad Aptitude to the fractured melody of the instrumental Hertz So Good. Yet there is undeniably something highly compelling in the ferociously neurotic funk-rock of Lonely Grave, the psychoanalytic dub of White Visitation, and the dragging psychodrama of Fur Immer Liebe. Perhaps not very cohesive, but at least intriguing. What the quartet lacks, however, is the vision (and perhaps the cohesion) to forge a truly personal style.

Shawn Greenlee, who played synthesizer for them in 1999-2001, was also active as Pleasurehorse, documented on Bareskinrug (2003) and Taitsu (2005).

Half Control (Load, 2009) collects unreleased material from 2001.

Six Finger Satellite's keyboardist John MacLean launched a solo career under the moniker of Juan MacLean. The single By the Time I Get to Venus (2002) aligned him with the disco-revival of the "electroclash" movement, while the EP Der Half-Machine (DFA, 2005), with I Robot and Less Than Human, offered robotic heartless synth-pop a` la Cabaret Voltaire or Human League, permeated with the old Devo-esque spleen of dehumanization. The funk orgy of Less Than Human (DFA, 2005) also hinted at Brian Eno's futuristic vignettes (AD 2003) and at Talking Heads' futuristic fusion (the frantic and demented electronic skit of Tito's Way), but its core is more mundane. The throbbing poppy Give Me Every Little Thing harks back to both the disco era (a` la Chic) and to dance-rock of the 1980s (a` la Thompson Twins). Shining Skinned Friend is a snapping industrial dance with trancey techno overtones. The 14-minute Dance With me is a great idea (a jazzy version of ambient house) that is poorly implemented. Unfortunately, most of the rest appropriates techniques and styles of house and techno music without much imagination. The light-weight Crush The Liberation is all that comes out of it.

The Future Will Come (DFA, 2009) enhanced Maclean's synth-based dance-pop with the vocals of LCD Soundsystem-affiliate Nancy Whang in the ethereal Happy House, the syncopated Tonight, and The Simple Life (a Giorgio Moroder-esque disco locomotive that harks back to acid house).

Six Finger Satellite reformed at the end of the decade and released A Good Year For Hardness (Anchor Brain, 2009), a much more conventional album than their classic ones.

Juan Maclean's Everybody Get Close (2011) is a collection of leftovers. MacLean's next solo album was In a Dream (2014).