✦✦✦✧ This is one of those relatively rare projects that features Mike Patton but isn’t entirely an exercise in unlistenable self-indulgence. And actually, the real star of the show here is guitarist Mike Crain, who is at least as focused on texture and noise than hardcore riffing. All for the good; even Dave Lombardo is less ostentatious, in service of the music.

✦✦✧✧ I’m sure there are great ways to avoid having Dead Cross sound like “Mike Patton, Dave Lombardo, and two other dudes.” This album, however, is not one of them.