Chloë — Untitled II
The Chloë project brings together two of the most respected names in Swedish/European 'wall making'- we have: Karl T of HNW project Skönhet & Självhat, and he also runs cult HNW tape label HarshFuckedForLife Records- which is known for it's large and elaborate tape box sets. And Hannes H- whose one half of highly respected, macabre, brutal & long running HNW project Concrete Threat.
This second release comes in the form of a C30 tape, and it’s a self released tape by Hanes & Karl. The tapes cover features a rather suggestive picture of Ms Moretz blowing a bubble gum balloon- I think the still comes from her appearance in Tim Burton's gothic horror soap opera movie Dark Shadows.
The tape features a single 15 minute track per side of tape. On side one we have “Death Is...”, & this starts out with a sample from one of Ms Moretz moives (not quite sure, which one as I don’t recognize the sample) with her doing a whispered chanting sort of thing over a melancholic piano string swooned film soundtrack backing- then with-in a minute we’re into the noise meat of the track. The ‘wall’ slams in with huge dense brutality- it mixes together blown-out bass bound juddering ‘n’ draging, with weaves of mid range static jittering. The blown-out bass judder almost seems like a hulking ‘n’ crushing huge monster, as it seemingly sways, judders & drags it’s meaty self through the track. As the track progresses the blown-out bass tone seems to become more consistent & rapid in it’s feel, as if it’s trying to keep-up with the mid-range static jitter; which has now more of a crisp feel to it. Though there is seemingly movement here, the track remains tight ’n’ dense through-out.
Flipping over to side two we have “...What They Deserve”, and this starts off with a sample of Ms Moretz talking about getting back at someone. Then with-in less than a minute we’re into the noise- this brutal/ dense ‘wall’ mixers together muffled ‘n’ pummelling almost blunt machine like noise churns, with shifting ‘n’ semi submerged ribs of mid- paced billowing & jittering. At times the track almost sounds like a bent, buckled & muffled recording of slowed down African tribal music, yet it never really defines into any clear rhythmic shape- it just rages ‘n’ batters against it self. As the track progresses the pair nice shift 'n' slice the two main tonalities against/ around each other in a very appealing manner, as subtle sub-tones slip ‘n’ slide around them.
Both tracks here are brutal & perfectly formed examples of dense yet detailed & creative HNW. So another great release from this project, the only downside about the whole thing is once again it was ltd to very small number, which pretty much disappeared as soon as it was released. This is well worth hunting down if you can.