Merzbow — Kamadhenu
The Merzcow albums are themed around the worship of cows with in the Hindu religion, and this first part takes it’s name from the Hindu goddess who is the mother to all cows. The digit-pak is rather colourful & spacey featuring on the front cover a picture of the human headed cow god Kamadhenu. On the back there’s a colourful diagram of various spiritual places on a cow. And inside we have various space like scapes, with a rather neat descending/ swirling star way under the disc it’s self
Anyway enough about the packaging onto the cd it’s self- the album features three tracks “Kamadhenu (Part 1)”, “Kamadhenu (Part 2)” & “Churning Of The Cosmic Milk Ocean”. All three tracks hit just over or under the twenty minute mark, and the first track “Kamadhenu (Part 1)” is the longest of the three at the 21.55 mark, and it really is a great start to this very rewarding & quite original sounding Merzbow album. The tracks built around a mixture of deep, throbbing & spacey synth noise textural drones, that are layered & ribbed with atmospheric/seared feed back sustains, dips & screams that have a distinctive eastern feel about them. Also layered into most of tracks running time is this great subtle and stripped looped electro rhythmic textures that sounds a bit like a malfunctioning yet looped 70’s sci-fi robot. The tracks rolls out in quite a slow, brooding yet spacey eastern manner, and the throbbing ‘n’ spacey synth drones really seem to drill deep into your very being.
“Kamadhenu (Part 2)” comes in at just under the twenty minute mark, and it’s a great & really quite odd sounding yet effective mixture of speed-up & eastern drum electro space jazz texture, churning & twitting mid-tone electro swims, and screaming ‘n’ moody controlled feed back soloing.
So lastly we of course have “Churning Of The Cosmic Milk Ocean”(whose title sounds like it could be an Acid Mother Temple track) and this is the baby of the bunch at just over the seventeen minute mark. This track is the least structured, yet cosmically psychedelic of the three tracks here- it’s built around a shifting & churning mixture of deep throbbing noise synth textures. Billowing, spacey & slightly eastern sounding electro pulse drifts. Semi buried noise sears & rages, and floating ‘n’ bobbing spacey electronics. Then at just under the tenth minute mark this great chopping, speed-up and out of focus electro rhythmic searing ‘n’ swimming element is added to the track & the whole thing takes on quite a strange air of seared & madcap playfulness.
Each of the three tracks here exude a spacey, playful, noisy & eastern electro air. And each track is rewarding in it’s own right as well as working as a consistent and rewarding whole. This is a truly wonderful start to this new series of Merzbow albums, and it’s up there with some of the best modern Merzbow’s album- truly a great album from start to finish….but it’s fairly ltd(350 copies) so act fast or regret later!