“Phylothene”, the first of five pieces, hits the ground running; with scorching skree and metal abuse. Its a savage squall of treble and distortion, punctuated with bursts of low-end over-saturation that jumps out of the speakers. Eventually, out of this wall of noise, there emerges what sounds like high-pitched electronics; but after a few squeals it becomes apparent that its Bloor’s violin, scraping through the distortion. The second track,  “Micrarhyncis”, begins with very nice metal sounds, against equally beautiful bassy tones and resonances. The metals are coaxed and clanged, processed backwards and layered; all scuttling amidst the hiss. They truly are quite beautiful sounds, delicate and sonorous - they really deserve to be recorded much more sympathetically. “Procyon” announces itself with a powerful jet thrust of noise, which continues billowing throughout the track. Below this, there again lurks that clipping, marauding bass; which takes a step back now and then, before collapsing in and crushing everything in its path. Near the very end of the track, some wonderful crackling enters; before I realise that it is, alas, the sound of the vinyl itself…

Flipping the record over, we find a nice series of noisy stabs and resonances; with Knurl finding space for the noise to breath and compose its own cadence. There’s some effective trading between high and low frequencies here too. Soon after, we are treated to an extended section of violin abuse; Bloor sawing away with inspired ugliness, in a jig that belongs in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre soundtrack. “Strictium” then ends with a very nice passage, coupling a thick low-frequency foundation, with metallic clangs that erupt out of the morass. The last track, “Praseosoma”, begins with a scourging drone of thickened violin; akin to a distorted organ, or a tone put through a delay pedal set to its lowest delay time. The whole piece is rather like a flame in the wind: buffeting the speakers, before falling back and then seconds later stretching itself again. The last stages of the piece are again marked by vinyl crackle; which is sometimes an irritation, sometimes an embellishment.

“Reactance” is a scuzzy assault, with swathes of distortion and skree. It doesn’t have the clinical tone of some noise projects, nor does it have any overt aggressive agenda; its simply good old-fashioned noise as sound and texture. These sounds and textures are kept within fairly tight boundaries, giving it a somewhat monochrome palette which works in its favour; it concentrates the album, where it could so easily wander. The tracks with more discernible violin sounds are the most exciting to my ears: the combination of bowed string and churning noise proving to be a perfect one. The metals, when heard alone, are really very beautiful; and an entire album just of Knurl exploring this would be very welcome. At its best, Knurl reminds me of Noggin, through a distortion pedal; and thats a good thing - and indeed, I now have to hunt through my dusty vinyl to find those Noggin discs…