Ex-Depeche Mode-r Alan Wilder, returns with the RECOIL project album number three, an album that will leave people constantly looking over their shoulders for decending planes.

Do you like scary movies? How would you like a real horrorshow flick flashing behind your eyes? 'Liquid' is one of those albums which, like a great book, totally captivates the imagination but unlike a silverscreen equivilant the imagery can spread outside the realm of possibility. This album is the story of a pilots life as his plane descends ground-ward. Rushing past his minds eye are visions of sexual encounters, tales of ghetto lovin', stories of weird existences, insights into various cancers of society which are chewed upon within the lyrics.

Let me set the scene: this sound is dark, so incredibly dark you might wanna get a pillow to put over your eyes - not that it will help when the lyrics have placed the pictures in your head! Filthy hip-hop beats and intense vocals, cover icy cold Tom Waits style sounds and various dramatic samples make this album The Blair Witch of the music world - although this record has not had the attention it so rightly deserves.

At no point does this album rush, everything is done slowly and calmly to thicken the profound incantation of the 'Liquid'. The voices of this album change from track to track. There is Diamanda Galás who has a clean cut, sexy voice. Nicole Blackman who sends shivers through ever piece of my anatomy; Nicole's voice is equally as seductive as Diamanda's, although it's hard to make out where Nicole comes from (maybe it was hell?!?). The Golden Gate Jubilee Quartet, add the sound of prison/jazz cool to this album. Samantha Coerbell's tones are interestingly soft, they lure you in, closer and closer to the speaker before a massive beat and scream knocks you out with a Muhammad Ali-stylee upper cut to the temple. Rosa M.Torras adds her native tongue to 'Vertigen' that has such a beauty without being able to understand a single word. In places such as "chrome" or "want" the want is to close your ears (that's where a pillow may come in handy for the more squeamish) as the words create a want to not be able understand them - the intense spoken images are of things such as masochistic bedroom habits and peoples souls jumping into the pits of hell. Curves, Dean Garcia provides additional musical genius on guitar and bass which adds the kind of edge you'd expect from the Curve man.

The albums combination of darkness, dusty beats and lyrical poetry are emotionally intoxicating right from the moment of tentatively touching the play button. Few albums have hit me quite as hard as this. There are no big distortion filled power cord thrashes or pompus screams of "RARRH" to you slap you the face. 'Liquid' uses the less equals more theory to create a feeling more like drowning everso slowly and painfully in a silo of corn than, well, in comparison to drowning in liquid.

Buy this, turn out all of the lights, open your mind and let the sound waves flood in.