Small Hours — Jerusalem
The siege took place between the 7th of June & July 15, 1099 at the time of the First Crusade. During the battle, the Crusaders stormed and captured the city from Fatimid Egypt. The Siege is most remembered due to massacre that followed it, when much of Jerusalem's population was slaughtered.
The pro-printed CDR features on it’s front a full colour reproduction of an old print that depicts the Siege. The CDR comes inside a clear plastic DVD case( bringing to mind the Altar Of Waste lable's packaging), and this features a double sided colour sleeve which takes in tow more prints/ plates depicting the siege.
The release features a single track that comes in at dead on the hour mark, and it’s up broken into four parts- I March Of The Righteous, II Siege of Siege, III The Barefoot Procession, and IV 'After The Defenders fled along the walls and through the city, and our men went with them, killing them and cutting them down as Solomon's temple,where there was such a massacre that our men were wading up to thier ankles in enemy blood'. Though the track never breaks for any of the parts, instead it's a cleverly moping slice of walled noise.
To start with the tracks first ‘wall’ is slowly faded- it's built around circling ‘n’ juddering low-to-mid ranged noise texture, and this is weaved with smaller sparkling ‘n’ cracking tones. As track progresses into it’s 6th minute the juddering & circling elements get deeper, rougher & more barbaric in their feeling, and a times you think they may break full out into all out shapeless noise brutality; but the ‘wall’ is always kept just under control. Underneath these the thinner crackling/ sparkling elements seem to have become doubled in their number, and they rather bring to mind thousand of tiny razor sharpe rain drops drifting in the wind. By the twelve minute the smaller/ thinner elements are become more & more obscured by the juddering ‘n’ circling textures which have now taken on a massed a brutal sound akin to twenty or thirty horses riding ‘n’ thundering around you. By the 17th minute the tracks deeper elements have turned into a truly brutal galloping ‘n’ descending sonic attack, and at this point either the smaller textural elements have completely gone or they are now totally blocked out.
By the 20th minute it’s just about a near galloping ‘n’ battering white-out, as the tones complete engulf & over take the ‘wall’ & your listening space. By around the 25th minute mark you can start to make out other clear textural detail (instead of just the brutal galloping), and these take in a slight stretched grey rapid judders, and a manic scraping/ hissing tone.
By the 33rd minute things are really, really slowing & thinning down with the galloping easing back & back with it’s rapidity, and the other noise textures petering back more & more too. By the 37th minute we’re left with a slowing & semi shunting low-end juddering tone, which is surrounded by locked & smaller tones that sound like freezing rain crackle .
By the 47th minute, just when it feels like it can’t slow down anymore, the pace starts to pick back up again as billowing & slightly roaming drone is mixed with a mat of thinner & smaller unformed jittering noise textures. By the 51 minute mark things have really got firm, brutal & dense again with a thick & rapid billowing drone, that is joined by a fast & crisper jittering tone.
With out a doubt “Jerusalem” is one of this years HNW highlights- as the shifting & morphing ‘wall’ is executed with such creative precision, sonic flare & brutal compositional twists & turns. Sadly the physical version of this was ltd to a very small edition, but a downloadable version(for just £2.00!) is available here on the projects bandcamp page.