The Sum Of Our Wounds is a collection from the cassette archives of Martin Rev of early demos and sketches for tunes that would end up on albums by Suicide or his own solo albums, they are as fearsomely experimental as anything he's previously released, also at times achingly beautiful, as this legend of the punk rock Avant Garde works out his ideas, helping to create the blueprint for much of the Techno and dance music to come along the way. These demos in many respects benefit from the so-called limitations of recording to Cassette, what that does for the dynamics within the compositions and experiments making this album a must hear album for any long-term fans of Suicide and Martin Revs solo works.
The album opens with Yearning that takes a simple fairground organ pattern, marries it to a sparse drum machine pattern that would be re-used more than a few times by Suicide, this tune expresses the essential nice/nasty dichotomy often at play in Suicides music.
Dreams is an early piano led instrumental sketch for the tune that became Dream Baby Dream as the simple drum pattern is overlaid with the organ and piano sounds that are achingly familiar.
Skateboard is like he's playing the skateboard as a percussion instrument, this is harsh like a recording of the sounds within a half-pipe with tribal drumming, off ramp effects, it's enthralling yet scary at the same time.
Laredo is like an out of control underground train, screeching wheels careening down the tracks with a propulsive beat, odd glitchy bumps with what sound like vocal hums being sung through a loud hailer or some other set up to distort them, this is hard as nails techno.
Zeitpunkt takes a thudding beat, surrounding it with sampled, distorted and deranged church bells, chiming against the beat, as pulsars come flying towards you, like your in the middle of an outer space fire fight, full of Phasers and laser beams attacking you.
Rio Grande is borderline chasms of sound, built around a simple keyboard pattern and preset drum machine loop, as they seem to be firing at anyone seen swimming in the river.
Baby O Baby (Mix) is harsher than how this tune ended up sounding, as this demo has deep vocals whispering in your ear, just what Martin wants to do with you tonight Baby, set against Sturm Und Drang new Raceion style techno beats.
Abracadabra certainly reaches out and grabs the listener in its 39 second burst. Line-Up has vocals from CC Rider being mutated in the speedy techno beats and synth effects to create a full parade of suspects.
El Barrio takes us back down to the borders as spectral synths pulse against the phasing and whooshing apparatus forcing us through that Barrio in intense burst of energy pulsing through everything.
She's Back and she might have lost her Diamonds Fur Coat And Champagne along the way, as this is more down at heel, like she's dragging her tail between her legs, as the pulses fly around her, she begs to be allowed one more chance, as the cascading sounds burrow into your brain.
Temptation (Mix) is as close to a nosebleed techno tune as Martin gets, this would still blow a large dancefloor away, as the insistent core of the tune grinds into your brain, the lighter keyboard almost bell like refrain gets subsumed into the maelstrom.
Asia (Mix) has doom laden bass piano figure that is being swarmed by the malevolent synths and drum machines colliding in agony.
Around The Corner could have been recorded from around the corner this is dense and brief.
Mari (Mix) is an early version of one of Martins solo classic tunes, only this is radically different to the album version with what sounds like a stylophone solo for the central part of the tune as the drum patterns shift around it.
The album closes with Whisper (Vocal) a tune that is worth getting the album for, a brilliant early version of Suicide classic Surrender with totally different vocals, this has the glorious beauty of Suicide at there romantic peak, as he pleads for love and to be told how much he is loved, this is sweet musically as well, as you Surrender to the magic of this music.
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