Boar — Drown Yourself
This release originally appeared last year on Boars own label in a small edition of 11 copies- this reissue offers up a whole new set of artwork, plus an extra track that wasn’t included on the first release. This reissue comes in a hand numbered edition of twenty copies.
The CDR opens with the just over three minutes unsettling & fairly subtle noise craft that is “Water Flooding Your Eyes”. The track is built around a mixture of fairly rapid backwards running elements, and these take in: eerier breathing/ muffled vocal like elements, and a selection rumbling & roasting noise textures. The track makes for an unsettling & effective start to the release.
Next up we have the new/ extra track, and this comes in the form of the just under six minute run time of “Forever Fucked”, which starts out as a rapid rolling 'n' seesaw HNW mix of billow low-end noise & locked industrial tinged tribal metal rolling battering. Around the minute thirty mark a extra crust of roasting & crackling static is added along with truly demonic baying & guttural vocals which unfolded in indecipherable yet intense/ pained manner. As the track continues it thins down briefly, before Boar slams back in with a truly intense & flesh roasting mass of mid-paced pummelling & jittering noise, with the vocals just been barely heard in the background…..as if the ‘wall’ has engulfed everything.
Lastly we have the title track which takes up the lion share of the release at just over the twenty eight minute mark. It all starts out with this worming ‘n’ drilling noised-up & intensified synth tone, which seems to intensely but slowly weave in & out of your ears in a buzzing, brutal & malevolent manner. At just over the four minute mark a slow accelerating machine drone is added to the mix, and it truly feels like your skull could pop-open at any moment. At just shy of the six minute mark we get a surprising & rapid switch as we descend down into a forking & junk lined rapid hash noise descent, as this section continues Boar nicely & rapidly switchers between slicing, searing, and ripping noise textures- going from finer high pitched darts & stabs, to more meaty tears & roaring bombardments. Things seem to settle down into slight more ‘wallish’ feel around the eleven minute mark, as a bouncing & baying meaty noise tone is under-fed by a more locked sliceing ‘n’ whistling undertones. At the twelve minute mark a stuck sputtering engine tone is added to the mix, and once again things get very intense & pressing- here Boar mixers together a range of low-to-mid range jitterings, with baying higher pitched tones. At just over the fifteen minute mark we fade down into the moody & introspective sound of stark guitar or bass playing- that feeds out a simple barren melody as the bleak sound of water laping against the shore-line is added. But just when you start to get into the moody cinematic vibe this sputtering & chopping element tears it all apart around the seventeen minute mark- as this
progresses Boar feeds us this stop/ start choped-up pitter patter of intense noise tones which sits some where between taut minimalistic noise texturing & sustained/ noise based electronics. At the twenty minute mark we have a brief rush of low-end roasting noise, before we go through a few twist ‘n’ turns of different low-end noise roast ‘n’ simmers that are underfed by searing higher pitch (at times slugish) tone slides & shifts. At the just before the twenty six minute mark the track strips to backwards & slowed breathing elements, and we return to the eerier yet intense start of the release.
With out a doubt “Drown Yourself" is one of the highlights of Iowa based projects three or four year existence, and the extra track & artwork enhancement makes a great release even better. Truly this is a great multi layered noise release that is both moody, intense, brutal and atmospheric… I strongly advise you to pick up a copy of this before there are all gone!.