Root Cellar — Steins Pillar

Steins Pillar is a forty-minute example of buffeting ‘n’ battering walled noise- which has a decidedly gnarled, crude, and muffled feel to it’s unrelenting attack. The wonderful named Root Cellar are from Eugene, Oregon- they’ve been active since 2019, and thus far put out coming on for ten releases- with seeming all of these have been digital-only release- which this release is also, and it’s available from the project bandcamp

The release takes it title from Steins Pillar- a 350-foot-tall pillar that stands shooting up from the alpine tree lined slops of the Ochoco Mountains in Oregon. So it’s certainly a neat theme for a walled noise release, though I’m not sure if I’m getting vibes of a tall stone pillar. To me it feels more wood bound in its make-up, though of course, this could relate to the tall alpine forest that surrounds the pillar.

The single track here comes in at fifteen seconds over the forty-minute mark- and what we have here is a rather set, dense, though rather organic feeling wall. The track is built around layers of fairly rapid knock, tumbling, and banging tones- with a constant static grain pop, and some rumbling murky earthy churning & ripped grain rolling in the background. As mentioned early there is a decidedly wood bound feel to many of the tone here- and in my mind, I’m getting images of several people or animals stuck inside a wooden lined underground tunnel- constantly running & banging to get out- but the tunnel just seems endless.  I’m pretty sure the layers and the textures here are relative set in their focus- though throughout you get these wonderful with-in battering tones that sound like more rapid tap-dancing elements- again inside underground set wood, maybe a hyperactive little person or a child suddenly panicking ever so often. The whole thing is very entrancing in its attack-as one minds goes from following one tone to the next- the gritty grain pop initially felt a little focus break, but the deeper you get in this seems to fade as you get locked into the key wooden feel of the track.

This is the first release I’ve heard from Root Cellar, and I must say I was rather impressed by what we have here. As I mentioned on my intro this is just a digital release- and if you head hear you can DL and support this project head here. Let us hope they get one or two physical releases in the future, as I could see you could do some great packaging related to this type of release, and it’s always nice to see CDR or tape releases from the project- as then the material is there forever, even if the Bandcamp disappears.