Kulmhof — self Titled
The project takes it’s name & influence from the town of Kulmhof (or Chelmno, as it sometimes known) which was a small town roughly 50 miles from the city of Lodz in Poland. It was here in world war two where the first mass killings of Jew’s were made by the Nazi as part of their final solution. The camp set up in Kulmhof operated three gas vans(one is pictured on the release front sleeve) using carbon monoxide. The camp began operations on December 7, 1942, and ended operations on March 1943. It resumed operations June 23, 1944, and finally ceased operations January 17, 1945. The estimated number of deaths is 150-300,000, mainly Jews. A deeply grim theme/ subject.
The ‘wall’ enclosed here is suitable bleak, barren and nihilistic to fit the releases theme. On offer there are two tracks- firstly we have a German spoken word track, which finds tow men seeminly talk about the SS and the perfect kind of gas to kill people. Then the second track is the ‘wall’ it’s self which comes in at spot on the hour mark, and boy does this track drag your spirit & mood way down.
The ‘wall’s built around suffocating & muffled mid-paced cascade of stale grey judders & rumbles, these often quite sound like what it would be like to be locked inside a van gas chamber as it slowly fills with either exhaust flumes or poison gas vapours from an deadly chugging engine. The tracks sort of greyly tumbles and judders along in a grim & pained manner for it’s hours runtime. Mostly the 'walls' pretty fixed & locked in it’s state, but on a few occasions it does strip back a layer of tone or slightly shifting the ‘walls’ structure.
So this is a deeply grim & bleak slice of airless & muffled walled noise that’s themed around the start of the Nazi final solution. This is one for those who enjoy their ‘walls’ total hopeless, crusty & barren- grim sonics for a grim subject.