Wilt — Cemetery Road / Dead Electroniks
On offer here we have an album of new material in the shape of ‘Cemetery Road’ disc & a second disc of remixes/ sonic rethinks of Wilt material by others in the shape of the ‘Dead Electroniks’. ‘Cemetery Road’ is a wonderful collection of 11 mean ‘n’ moody tracks that summon up images of the darker more sinister side of America like: creepy sand engulfed old western towns, dank, thick & dread filled forest that could be the setting of Lovecraft stories. Abandoned & mist shored grave yards that emanate strange moans, creaking, peeling & decaying metal asylums thick with overgrowth & the wispered voices & screams of long dead occupants.
The two piece project utilize a mixture of organic & electronic elements to paint there doomed, dark & creepy atmospheric arcs. We have dark & ominous electronic drone hung with doomed & slow moiving piano clunks, ‘creaking & haunted rocking seat’ country rock drones weaved with electro feedback atmospherics & doomed electroinc emissions. Creepy & spider web covered gothic organ dwells that mix with tar black electronic ambient drifts, off-colour & melodic piano weaves a-drift with dramatic guitar feed-back whines & electro brood. Dark & doomed post-rock scapes wearily bob & simmer along at a funeral procession rate as their gentle seared & pockmarked by noise raisers. The album starts off fairly grimly mid-pace, but over the 11 tracks it becomes more low-key murky, eerier & slowing; with the last quarter of the album been more about slow, dread soacked, and melancholic moodscaping.
The second disc of remixed tracks ‘Dead Electroniks’ features Wilt tracks that have been mainly given ambient remix by the likes of Climax Denial, Josh Lay, Lusasa Raelon,Veil of Secrecey, Locrain & a few others. In all there 13 tracks on this second disc & it focus much more on the more drifting & creepy ambient side of Wilts sound. On the whole it’s ok, but of lot of it just sounds rather similar, hazy and too drifting in its feel for it’s own good. The disc feels very undefined & mostly lacks the more clunking, discordant & creepy organic edges that the first disc benefits from. There are also less identifiable & tangible melodies, moods & structures here with the whole thing feeling too unfocused & lacking dramatic edger. So ultimately one comes away with an ambient remix disc that has it’s moments, but mostly just drifts & ebbs along in a rather uninspired & samey manner. there are a few more noisy tracks littered through-out which shakes things up a little but there’s too few to make a real impact on the dreary & dull drifting frame work of the disc as a whole.
So in summing up the first disc of new material is very grimly rewarding, darkly atmospherically sound & fairly varied collection of dark & sinister mood setting instrumental pieces. But sadly the second disc is too wish-washy, similar sounding & frankly bland to play in one sitting. Very worth pick-up for the first disc, but don’t expect too much from the second & just treat it as a bonus that ok in small sonic bites.