Album Review: Binary Order – The Future Belongs to the Mad (Self Released)

Releasing on the 28th of November 2023, ‘The Future Belongs to the Mad’ is the new album from genre defying solo musician Benjamin Blank aka Binary Order. An album of significance, as Benjamin explains himself:

It’s never easy to be honest about these kind of things, but I feel it’s important with this release to be so. The Future Belongs To The Mad was written during possibly the most difficult period I’ve ever had to get through – a period I’m not actually done dealing with – and one from which I now fear I shall never depart.

This album is an expression of my own inability to find meaning or purpose in life. And the utter disdain and emotional distraught that comes from the accumulation of living like that year, after year, after year. With this album I’ve managed to turn something that is for all intents and purposes destroying me, and created what is without any doubt in my mind, the greatest accomplishment of my life.

I don’t know if there is going to be anymore Binary Order after this. Finishing this album felt like an impossibility at one point, and now it’s done I feel like I am too. I hope anyone who listens to this can find something of value for within it. If not then I just appreciate having this platform to express myself in this way because it has kept me alive.

There’s a lot of layers to this album, let’s get that clear from the start, and it might take several listens to really find a lot of it sinking in. Layers of honest emotion that comes from a dark place, layers of heart and soul that exposes a lot, and layers of musical talent that continue to defy expectations. The Future Belongs to the Mad will have an effect on just about everyone.

When so much has gone into the creation of a record, as is the case here, it’s important that the listener feel that. Binary Order has proven in the past to excel in this area, yet nothing done up to this point has had quite the impact that this record does. Something that is prominent from the start with the heavy industrialisation sound of Consternation, the manic electronica of Cells Within Cells, and the crushing Perfect World. The back and forth of vocal styles is spectacular. The atmosphere is thick already, and there’s a clear determination to release some pent-up intensity from Binary Order here.

Yet, it’s the contrast between alt-tinged heaviness and thick melodious atmosphere that often stands out the most. Encapsulated by the heart-wrenching dark ambience of Hope Is A Mistake and the mellower Feel Again. The latter oozes emotion but is a little more ethereal because of its lighter melodies.

Continuing to create layers of moody atmosphere with creative depth, Skin is a gothic-tinged and sci-fi infused electronic effort and Left Behind rattles the soul with its heavy industrial crashes. Both sounding particularly unique on an album that is filled with unique ideas. Before Faces Beneath the Waves brings the energy back up with a fitting and spitting blast of fire and fury. Binary Order is a man possessed here, and it will give you heart palpitations.

Yet, once again, it is layered with powerful melody and atmosphere. The further into the void the listener goes with Binary Order, the more the senses become accustomed to the gloom.

It is all encompassing and the longer this album goes on, the more intense the feelings that Binary Order creates, grow. By time the latter portion explodes outward with the resounding Displaced, the blend of dreams and nightmares that is Slow Blade, the tear-jerking title track, and the powerful finale of Atone, most will be transfixed by what they are hearing. The flow of these final few tracks, and the album overall, is exceptional, and it never feels too long or too cumbersome.

That’s credit to Binary Order’s creative abilities, and if this is the last thing we get from Benjamin Blank in this guise, he signed off in impressive fashion.

Binary Order – The Future Belongs to the Mad Track Listing:

1. Consternation
2. Cells Within Cells
3. Perfect World
4. Hope Is a Mistake
5. Feel Again
6. Skin
7. Left Behind
8. Face Beneath the Waves
9. Displaced
10. Slow Blade
11. The Future Belongs to The Mad
12. Atone

Links

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