Drinking Gasoline/Gasoline in Your Eye

On the two-record set Drinking Gasoline, Cabaret Voltaire stand oddly balanced between accessibility and abrasiveness. On each of the album's four tracks (one track per side), Kirk and Mallinder combine simple, repetitive keyboard riffs and basslines with jerky drumbeats, and proceed to beat them to death over the course of eight minutes or so. In typical CV fashion, eerie voices float through the mix and Mallinder doesn't sing the lyrics so much as chant them. Each of the tracks has enough juice to grab the ear for a few minutes, but they tend to wear out their welcome after a while. Still, for those few minutes at least, "Kino" and "Ghostalk" in particular rank among the Cabs' more infectious compositions. In this case, less would have been more, but Cabaret Voltaire fans with long attention spans will find Drinking Gasoline worth a listen. ~ Bill Cassel