Review: Planningtorock “All Love’s Legal”

03 Feb 2014 — Evelyn Malinowski

There is something saddening about admission, to obtaining a goal much dreamt of.

Planningtorock’s highly anticipated All Love's Legal, out in the matter of a few weeks on Human Level Recordings, more than presents us to this acute emotion. While the album possesses experimental dance songs like “Misogyny Drop Dead” and “Let’s Talk about Gender Baby," which are doubtlessly of anthem caliber, other songs like “Welcome,” “Words are Glass,” and "Answerland," ensue striking ambient embodiments of melancholy after admission. In this context, the saddening admission is that gender equality and human rights for all are still overshadowed by xenophobia and oppressive religious belief. The album's tones of sadness are rooted in lamentation for dreams of a better political environment, for not being told that you cannot "fall in love with whoever you want to." It’s like we’re not in 2014, and the hands of feudalism, which worked to try and model society after antiquated depictions of the ascent to heaven, are gripping desperately on modern society before they can't to hold on anymore.

Medievalism is inherently misogynist, and while PTR shouts with her difficult-sounding voice that misogyny should drop dead and step back, it is the patriarchical practice of marriage that corrals us, which should see the ax first, and head over and out. Furthermore, taking into account the themes of steps on the album, we have ourselves a funny sort of medieval deconstruction of All Love's Legal.

13th century poet Chretien de Troyes epitomized the melancholy that succeeds admission and obtainment in the Arthurian romance Erec and Enide. Although this romance comes from a literary epoch around 1170, it communicates a timeless, tragic aspect of heroism: putting down your sword after getting the lady of your dreams. Due to their intense attraction, Erec and Enide hardly leave the bed after their wedding until Enide, satisfying the feminine eavesdropper archetype, overhears Erec’s former comrades talk shit about his becoming a lover: "He turned all his attention to embracing and kissing her; he pursued no other delight. His companions were grieved by this and often lamented among themselves, saying that he loved her far too much."

Then Enide admits this to Erec: “My lord, since you press me so, I shall tell you the truth; I shall conceal it from you no longer, but I fear it will distress you. Throughout this land all people … are saying that it is a great shame that you have laid down your arms. Your renown has greatly declined …. It grieves me deeply when they speak so, and it grieves me even more that they place the blame on me."

To offset their toxic lulling, they go on a journey together with a rule that disallows Enide to look back at Erec riding behind her. This metaphor, arguably, is about punishing Enide for her admission. Be that the case or not, it is still Erec’s admission and obtainment of the object of his affection that initializes crisis in the tale; it is Erec’s obtainment that causes others, including Enide, to lament.

I draw on de Troyes because it reflects on the lamentation afoot on PTR’s new work and likewise subverts the misogynistic promotion bound to art in medieval society. While Erec and Enide struggle due to giving into heterosexual, ordained love, PTR contends with the burden of having to speak up for ongoing issues concerning gender equality in the modern day, since ambivalance seems to have taken over to an extent. The haunted, ineffable parts of All Love's Legal specifically come from a struggle similiar to Enide's, that state of awareness of a truth that the target audience doesn't want to hear. Just because some progress has been made as far as equality goes doesn’t mean that the journey to make the situation more sustainable and gender aware should pause. What happened with the members of Pussy Riot between 2012 and 2013 in Russia is an enormous example, and irrefutably part of the inspiration behind this album's concept. 

Can PTR’s next album please be a full-on ambient one, exploring the sound of this phenomenon further? In the mean time, All Love’s Legal is indeed a chivalrous performance at the court of an already gender aware kingdom. Let’s help it reach the serfs who scoff at or are unaware of using human drama to learn about the nature of love and liquidity of sexuality.

All Love's Legal is out February 18th on Human Level Recordings.