RUBIK

Line-up: The original line-up consisted of Artturi Taira (vocals, guitar, keyboards), Arttu Hasu (bass), Lauri Hiekkala (guitar), Samuli Pöyhönen (keyboards, guitar) and Sampsa Väätäinen (drums). Hasu and Hiekkala left around 2007 after the debut album; the bass duties were then picked up by Jussi Hietala, forming the final quartet line-up pictured above.

Introduction TBC!

Main chronology:

• 2007: Bad Conscience Patrol
• 2009: Dada Bandits
• 2011: Solar
• 2013: Fake Music

Other releases:

• 2007: Jesus vs. People

BAD CONSCIENCE PATROL

1) Sleeps a Friendly Stranger; 2) A Hard Try; 3) City & the Streets; 4) Buildings; 5) Hinges; 6) Why Don't You Let It Happen; 7) The Interventionist; 8) Jesus/Hypnotist; 9) Bill Withers; 10) Wrappt in a Carpt

Rubik's one and only entry into the guitar rock canon, indebted to their inspirations as they were - but what a great rock band they made.

It's funny how the same thing can look so different when viewed in retrospect. Once upon a time Bad Conscience Patrol sounded like a new band making an exciting and promising entrance: it's an album that takes plenty of clearly recognisable inspiration from other, more popular acts in forming its sound, but it also has so much of great songwriting and the band's own personality coming through that it was clear Rubik would be a force to reckoned with once they'd find their own voice. Which they in fact did find, so much so that Bad Conscience Patrol barely bears a resemblance to anything that came afterwards. The debut album now comes across like a bizarre relic out of place in the band's discography, the kind of release that you wouldn't necessarily recommend other people to start with and even if those same people fall in love with the subsequent albums, you still have to accompany your encouragement to check out the first album with plenty of caveats. There are enough hints in Bad Conscience Patrol of what's to come that you can clearly link the two iterations of the band together if you're paying attention, but much of what made early Rubik specifically so interesting in the first place ultimately proved to be a little misleading of what actually makes them a great band.

Bad Conscience Patrol is a child of its times, moving through various strains that rock bands took in a post-OK Computer world, particularly in the Nordics. Radiohead and their millennial paranoia and anxiety are the most notable source of inspiration, but they hold hands with sky-piercing anthems a lá early Kent and Mew's crooked prog playfulness. Bad Conscience Patrol wears its influences quite literally on its sleeves given the lyrics in the sleeve notes are arranged in the same erratic structures as OK Computer's, and some songs lean towards their inspirations more than others, particularly "Wrappt in a Carpt" which sounds like it was written immediately after binging on OK Computer, the Yorke-isms of the title included. Bit by bit though Rubik carefully flash their own character throughout and make it obvious there's more to them than just their record collection: the bonkers rhythm-flicking assault of "Buildings" has the energy of a cat freaking out and running around the room, "Why Don't You Let It Happen" shifts moods from murky organ pitter-patter to a jovial march and eventually an epic closure like three songs perfectly inhabiting a single skin, and in hindsight "Jesus/Hypnotist" may as well have a giant neon-lit arrow sign pointing at it as the direction the band would move towards next (and more on that later). Taken as as a full 10-song experience Rubik's own characteristics eventually take prominence over the parts where it's easy to connect the dots to other artists, particularly coming through in the band's quixotic restlessness where brighter melodies intersperse with crunchy riffs and the listener is left guessing what's going to happen next. "Sleeps a Friendly Stranger" and the aforementioned "Buildings" harness Rubik's manic energy into slightly askew rock anthems that rampage like wild beasts in an enclosed space, "The Interventionist" and "Bill Withers" feature the album's heaviest walls of sound with the former a emotion-laden cry for action and the latter sinking into the darkest depths the record goes, and while "Hinges" tones down the guitars and locks into a groove it keeps its tension bubbling under, where the nervous wait for the inevitable release is tangible. Layered all over this are Taira's vocals which really uplift Rubik as Rubik: his tone and way of phrasing (and frantic flicks between ranges) can't be traced to anyone else and it anchors the rest of the record together. Besides, even when they are most obviously paying tribute to their idols, the songwriting stays strong: "Wrappt in a Carpt" doesn't have a single original bone to it but it's a haunting finale for the album, leaving the listener hanging with a sudden comedown ending that sounds as hopeless as it is pretty.

On three particular occasions Rubik completely knock it out of the park, and it's the album's impeccable singles run which show Bad Conscience Patrol at its strongest. "A Hard Try" sounds like a classic radio hit that never was: an honest-to-god guitar anthem that reaches blissfully cathartic highs through its melodic firework choruses, showcasing Rubik's strength as an alternative rock unit without any trappings or complications thrown over the soaring hooks. It shows that if they wanted to, Rubik could to go head-to-head with any of their more popular peers and likely win the fight. Closer towards the end of the tracklist, the bright, airy and melodic "Jesus/Hypnotist" is a stark contrast to the rest of the album's cool anxiety that the song in itself is a massive surprise when it appears, and it's only its guitar-revved conclusion that brings it in line with the rest of the record. But its colourful pop twinkle is a thing of beauty and marvel, cutting through the particularly grim shades of the album's second half with its ecstatic flurry of layered melodies and high-rising vocal runs. If you're also more familiar with Rubik's later albums (which is likely to be the case if you're even remotely aware of the band in the first place), here's where you can find some common ground as "Jesus/Hypnotist" would become the blueprint for Rubik to eventually take forward: what sounded like a strange outlier back in the day, now acts like foreshadowing and in hindsight is the album's most uniquely Rubik-esque moment.

But it's not the best song on the album, because that honour goes to the phenomenal "City & the Streets". For four and a half minutes it sounds like the only song that ever matters, soaring with its euphoric sense of bittersweetness and content melancholy and Taira's mumbling falsetto immediately establishing itself as one of the most captivating voices of the mid-late 2000s Finnish indie scene. "City & the Streets" is, for my money, one of the very best songs that came out of that incredibly fruiful and exciting treasure trove of a scene and is practically a landmark of the era: a song where the presented melodies, the lushness of the guitars and the captured atmosphere are so immediate and captivating that they practically trap your attention. Across its runtime the song ebbs and flows, gently setting the pieces in place for its grand finale where layered vocals, towering guitars and shimmering keyboards cascade into a song that's both ready to take on the world while keeping itself close and personal to the listener. It's lush and powerful, a song that in a better world would have been destined to become an evergreen legend of its era - and it is for me.

Hidden between the lines across those highlights and those dashes of their own personality throughought lies the "unique selling point" (if you will) of Bad Conscience Patrol. This is the least of Rubik's three proper albums and it's undeniable that they became a better band the moment they reinvented themselves... but also, this album makes a really strong case for what a great rock band Rubik were. The band are molding their wild ideas into a shape that's on one hand more conventional and something we've all heard before, but which in Rubik's hands becomes something that frequently surprises, inspires and, in the end, still excites. It's practically inevitable that Bad Conscience Patrol is spotlighted by its own estrangement from the discography it resides in, so much so that even trying to simply talk about it as its own musical experience has to be framed through its contrast to its successors - but it speaks for the album strength's that it has survived through those endless comparisons rather than having become a Pablo Honey-esque awkward spot that has to be acknowledged (to continue with the Radiohead references). Instead of a debut with a great promise, it stands proudly on its own qualities as an excellent rock album that's been made with familiar building blocks but built with oddball twists and curves that would make you question the architect's sanity. Rubik were a different band here but they were an excellent band, developing in the right direction from the debut EP - and having spent extensive time traversing through the Finnish independent music scene ca. 2000s, I wouldn't hesitate to call Bad Conscience Patrol a minor classic of that era.

Physically: Clear jewel case, with a simple lyrics booklet.

OTHER RELEASES

JESUS VS. PEOPLE

CD1: Jesus EP (2007): 1) Jesus; 2) Motorik Haiku; 3) Telec; 4) Swim Swim Swim; 5) Hell=; 6) Yes I Know But Thank You Anyway
CD2: People Go Missing EP (2004): 1) Telecvokning; 2) Haiku Motorik; 3) Don't Take a Swim; 4) Feel Like a Spark; 5) [untitled]; 6) Just Heads Dropping

The muscular debut EP and the defter (partial) remake, hand in hand.

After Bad Conscience Patrol was released Rubik quickly grew in popularity, and to both strike while the iron was still hot as well as give the new fans a chance to hear more from the band, the decision was made to reissue the band's 2004 debut EP People Go Missing. However, Rubik didn't want to just push out some old material in a new package and call it a day. So instead, we got the two-disc Jesus vs. People. On the second disc you could find People Go Missing presented as it was (including hiding the instrumental 50-second piano interlude from the tracklist), while the disc presented first in order is dubbed the Jesus EP and which presents, together with a couple of new songs, half of the songs from People Go Missing re-envisioned and re-recorded by a now more experienced band itching to spread their wings. Rubik refused to simple retread the past: they wanted to showcase they were already looking forward as well.

By People Go Missing Rubik were already quite well formed and you can't really tell there's a three-year gap between the EP and Bad Conscience Patrol. It's a moody and intense listen, filled both with thick atmospherics you could slice through with a knife as well as a dynamic, propelling muscle that broke through those scene-setting textures with brute force, and nothing showcases that better than its leading star "Haiku Motorik". Starting with just a steady but already chair-rocking beat and a contrastingly twinkling piano melody, "Haiku Motorik" eventually transforms into a swarm of guitars, keyboards and sheer power as if by a flick of a switch - and for myself and I presume for many others as well, that flick is the moment when Rubik went from a better-than-average MySpace act to a genuine thing to keep paying attention to. "Haiku Motorik" is by and far the best thing on the EP and remains a highlight even in the overall discography, and its primal force still sounds fresh and vital, but it's accompanied by great company too. The creeping, stop/start/quiet/loud opener “Telecvokning” creeps up to the scene by balancing between hushed, minimalist passages made of dubbed-out rhythms and time-lost woodwinds, and those big guitars that early Rubik were so characterised by; on the other side of "Haiku Motorik", “Don’t Take a Swim” completes the impressive opening barrage with a more laidback, almost lounge-like groove which builds up to a surprisingly intense end result during its runtime, while also treating the listener to the EP's most hooking melodies. The second half of the EP doesn’t quite measure up to its first, as after such a varied start the emphasised focus on slow-building steps and extended passages of the calmer “Feel Like a Spark” and the rawer “Just Heads Dropping” simply feel a little tame. They are, undoubtedly, still good songs though and "Feel Like a Spark" in particular almost has the ingredients to be the EP's secret ace in the sleeve, falling just short of it.

Given the above, it makes sense that it’s the first half of People Go Missing - the best songs - that Rubik chose to bring back for the Jesus EP. The new EP foreshadows the band’s move away from the more traditional rock sound of their debut into a more developed sound of their own, toning away some of the guitars and beginning to introduce new sonic ideas – whilst here it's mainly some electronic flavouring, the band do play around with textures and song structures throughout the disc. “Motorik Haiku” takes this the furthest as the once-explosive burst of raw rock power has become a full-on synth pop/indietronica jam, with the original structure and melodies toyed around with and used as a reference point rather than a rigid exoskeleton. It's an enjoyable romp in its own way and I don't mind the sound as such, but I miss the dynamics of the original and the remake sounds a little toothless in comparison. On the other hand “Telecvokning” (now just “Telec”) is retained mostly similar to the original, but the production now has all kinds of additional textures and noises surrounding the familiar quiet/loud switches and the song concludes with a more definitive grand finale, going all-out rocking rather than swinging back and forth between the extremes like the original - whilst the 2004 version was already great, the new version successfully makes it both more leaner and meaner and it might just be the definitive version out of the two. “Swim Swim Swim” meanwhile speeds up "Don't Take a Swim", with the beat under the song now hurriedly shuffling along. I could go either way – I prefer the surrealistically chill vibe of the original version but the band themselves sound more excited in the remake and I do admit it's a little catchier, and in all honesty they both have their strengths to an equal degree.

The last two songs on Jesus are brand new but they still follow in the footsteps of People Go Missing, by ending the EP with two slow and atmospheric dirges. Much like with the first EP as well, these are lesser works compared to the rest and I can't help but feel like they're not here because the band though these were a couple of great songs they had ready that they needed to share, but rather because they wanted to mirror the debut EP and so purposefully wrote two similar pieces to match the original set of closers. That said, “Hell=” can sometimes catch the listener with its unassuming prettiness and delicacy, with some lovely gliding guitar work in its second half. The apocalyptic “Yes I Know But Thank You Anyway” is all about the build-up and gets almost post-rock-like as it continues its booming crescendo, but for all its dramatic bluster there's little to hold onto it beyond just the volume, and it's the weakest cut across the entire two-disc set. The last (and technically the first) song of the new EP is the lead track “Jesus”, which is more or less a radio edit of the Bad Conscience Patrol highlight "Jesus/Hypnotist", now with the extended collapse and rebuild of its middle section having been chopped off for radio consumption. While it's ostensibly been included because it was the last single of the album era and this is its roundabout single release, it's no coincidence that it's this song that leads this teaser trailer of where the band are right now: out of anything on the album and even across these two EPs, it's the colourful melodic lushness of "Jesus" that most clearly indicates what Rubik's future would look like.

Regardless, the main grab here is People Go Missing. As far as debut EPs go it's not a classic per se, but it's a powerful opening gambit and not only is it a worthy listen, but it's also worth going back to from time to time even after you've become familiar with the rest of the back catalogue. The Jesus side is a little more superfluous and it's mainly composed of good ideas rather than stand-out songs, but it makes for a curious companion to the original EP - and that's likely the intention too, rather than Rubik pretending these are strictly improved versions of the originals. It's certainly a far more interesting "extra" than the majority of early EP reissues get and worth a spin in itself, but unlike the "recommended" listening order I would start with the old songs and then move onto the new. The overall rating here falls squarely in the middle: a bit higher for People Go Missing, perhaps a little lower for Jesus.

Physically: Gatefold, with no booklet. The gatefold packaging in this is horribly tight, one of the tightest I've encountered - I remember causing a small tear onto the spine on my very first ever attempt at getting one of the discs out back in the day, and it's a miracle I've not damaged it even more over the years!