Top Bar
Musique Machine Logo Home ButtonReviews ButtonArticles ButtonBand Specials ButtonAbout Us Button
SearchGo Down
Search for  
With search mode in section(s)
And sort the results by
show articles written by  
 Review archive:  # a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

ScumEarth - Deranged Prototype [R.O.N.F. Records - 2009]

By day, Spain’s Alonso Urbanos is a graphic designer creating complex, photoshopped sleeves and flyers for metal and post-industrial scenes, but by night he has been translating the dystopian visions he’s shared with many of his clients into harsh electronics. His latest release, Deranged Prototype, neatly presents two such tracks of just over ten minutes each.

The title track is based around an engine whose cycle pounds away creating scattershot kicks that would resemble a rhythm were it not for the machine’s unreliability. Pressing firmly onto this latent lathe are the squeals, scratches and scrapes common to the harsh noise label. Clouds of sparks and oil are spat out smelling like hot metal as the low end boils, fighting for prominence. Occasionally the combined roar ceases only for the engine to come to life again, where fine adjustments briefly and randomly break the monotony.

For anyone who has attempted to record the power of a waterfall, the second track, Acid Storm Degradation, could be familiar. The roaring presence of the sheer force of nature can be humbling, but divorced of its physical impact it sounds the same as radio static when reproduced at home. This randomised channel of white noise persists throughout while screeching attempts to break its flow. Midway, the sound like an engine returns, this time it’s a chainsaw piling destructively and indiscriminately into various materials, each ringing out high frequencies amidst the sputtering wall. Finally all coalesces into the static, slipping and sliding through abandoned wavelengths.

While it’s no surprise to read that this was played and “recorded live with no overdubs or computers”, firing harsh noise at a wall and recording the chaotic results (both what sticks and what falls) is rarely premeditated. Despite a severely limited spectrum of emotions, noise’s antithesis to composition can astound and overwhelm, but all too frequently reverts to type as generic sounding releases fall thick and fast, like this ‘deranged prototype’.

Rating: 1 out of 5Rating: 1 out of 5Rating: 1 out of 5Rating: 1 out of 5Rating: 1 out of 5

Russell Cuzner
Latest Reviews

ScumEarth - Deranged Prototype
By day, Spain’s Alonso Urbanos is a graphic designer creating complex, photoshopped sleeves and flyers for metal and post-industrial scenes, but by night h...
170326   Full Moon High - Full Moon Hi...
170326   The Stuntman - The Stuntman( ...
170326   Life Is Cheap, But Toilet Pap...
160326   Hotel - Hotel( DVD)
160326   Bong-Ra - Esoterik
130326   Sham 69 - The Albums 1978- 80...
130326   Jürg Frey - Continuity, Fra...
130326   Adrián Demoè - Paino
120326   Jakob Ullmann - Solo I / Solo IV
120326   Ferdinand Schwarz - Listenin...
Latest Articles

Cliff Twemlow On Severin - Mancun...
One of last year’s real big surprises in the world of Blu-ray box sets was Bloody Legend: The Complete Twemlow Collection, as it was a wholly entertain...
030326   Cliff Twemlow On Severin - Ma...
260226   The Fall - Repetitious Histor...
290126   Crude ‘n’ Hope-corroding ...
231225   Creepy Images Books - Killer Art
221225   Best Of 2025 - Music, Sound &...
041225   The Spectral Sounds of The Pr...
281025   Michael Hurst Interview - Unb...
071025   Xiphos - The Rise And Fall Of...
030925   Third Window Films - A Label ...
130825   HNW fest- Barcelona- 12th Apr...
Go Up
(c) Musique Machine 2001 -2025. Twenty four years of true independence!! Mail Us at questions=at=musiquemachine=dot=comBottom