Vomir - Facedown [Uninvited Records - 2018]Facedown is a sixty-minute slab of cluttering, scuzzy, rough-hewed- yet cleverly detailed walled noise. This pro pressed CD releases appears on New Jersey noise label Uninvited Records, and it certainly stands as one of the more brutally enchanting & involving releases to appear from the pretty constant flowing discography of French wall-noise legend Vomir. The pro pressed CD comes in a clear jewel case- on the cover front, fitting the release's title, we a monochrome picture of a battered & bent solitary soldier lying in rubble. The inside tray features a blue filtered & hazed picture of Vomir performing one of his (un) live performances, facing away from the audience. With the back cover featuring two cut in half black geometrical shapes, on either side of a dense & dark greyish background. The release appeared in September of last year, getting a fairly scene generous release of 100- though I wouldn’t hang around too long, as Vomir release have a tendency to disappear fairly quickly.
The Untitled track comes in at sixty-two minutes( though oddly on the labels bandcamp it’s fifty minutes)- and really it’s everything you expect, want & need from a Vomir track. It’s built around a crude, yet controlled & expertly balanced wall- that brings together a choppy & blunt low-end descent, a cluttering & rumbling judder, with fizzing mats of static feast 'n' spit- all underfed by a pressing almost aquatic tension. The ‘wall’ is certainly very weighty, and to start with feels typically full & crude in its attack- yet like the best wall work, over time & prolonged listens you notice new layer nuances & textural quirks. As with 99 per cent of Vomirs work this is very much set & focused in its wall structure- yet, once again like the best of his work you get effective audio illusion occurring when you really let your self fully & completely fall into the wall, blocking out the rest of the world around you.
Sure- if you weren’t a Vomir Fan before, Facedown will doubtfully turn you- as this is still very much extremely dense & at first seemingly uninviting wall-craft. But if you dabbled in the Frenchman’s discography in the past, and do enjoy lengthy submersion in crude-yet-detailed & balanced HNW I think you’ll very much want to add this CD to your collection. Roger Batty
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