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Vision Of One is the fourteenth full-length album from Θ (Theta) aka Greek now living in Norway Themistoklis Altintzoglou. The sound on this five-track album slips between the gaps of drone, manipulated environmental field recordings, ambience, and low-key noise/ industrial texturing- to create a highly atmospheric, at times mysterious album which at its best feels akin to a darker, beat-less and hazed take on the type of thing Future Sounds Of London were doing with albums like Lifeforms & Dead Cities
Gold of Nubty severs up two slices of dense yet jumping ‘n’ jittering walled noise from this Massachusetts based project. The digital release has a full runtime of just shy of eighty minutes- with one fifty-minute wall, and a second nearing a thirty-minute wall.
Here we have a wall noise split offering up over an hour and a half of raging ‘n’ baying wall-craft, with each contributor presenting a single around forty-six-minute track. Featured here are Italy’s Rapace, and Kansas City, Missouri based godNOISEgod.
Within the broad field of the keyboard composition sits the LA-based John Carroll Kirby, who has written for, produced, and collaborated with, a host of musical all-stars. In his latest release, Dance Ancestral, the fifth Kirby has created for Stones Throw, the recording polymath has managed to round off much of the harder edges of free improvisation by mixing in a lighter, ambient vibe to envelop his soloing on keys and synths.
Here we have a double CD set of compilations from the 70s focusing on the wackier, novelty focused and funky side of the reggae genre. Each disc features twenty-eight tracks a piece so you get a lot of bang for your buck- as well as a great selection of tracks too.
Vetus Supulcrum is a dungeon synth project hailing from the Netherlands. It's mastermind is Maurice De Jong-a highly prolific artist, behind the likes of Gnaw Their Tongues, De Magia Veterum, Temple Mist etc, with his work moving from, black metal, industrial, the darkly experimental, and dungeon synth . A Shroud Of Desolation is Vetus Supulcrum sixth full length, released via Signal Rex on cassette and CD.
Apocalyptic neofolk poet David Tibet has created music since his beginnings with the industrial movement of the early 80's, creating numerous visionary works of spoken word in a style one might describe as interdimensional divination informed by intense theological and historical research. In 2022, years after what he may have previously predicted would be the end of the world, we find David's soft and expressive voice still singing.
Released in the mid-1980's Henry: Portrait of A Serial Killer is one of the defining, highly important and still deeply troubling benchmarks in serial killer cinema. It’s a blend of stark kitchen sink psychodrama and grimy warts ‘n’ all character study- which is fed through with haunting & disturbing snapshots of death, and all-out brutal/ gruelling murder. Here from Arrow Video UK, is a new double-disc Blu Ray release of the film- bringing together a 4k scan of the picture, a new commentary track, and a good selection of excellent new and old extras.
Slow to burn and slow to build, this deliberately paced debut album from Parasite Nurse takes all the gruff, harsh beauty of noise and pairs it with the drawn-out, ebb and flow of a themed ambient track. Using her modular synth to create an almost cinematic noise experience, Parasite Nurse combines the urgent, pressing nature of harsh, vibrant electronics with the relaxed, exploratory soundscape style of pacing to achieve great results. Caretaker is an excellent noise exploration through any room one's sitting in or thought train one's taking.
From Cherry Red’s soul, disco, and funk sub-label Robin Songs here’s an eight CD boxset bringing together the total output from Philadelphia’s The Trammps-who were one of the first disco bands, penning such dance floor classics as "Disco Inferno", "Love Epidemic", and "Hold Back the Night". This set highlights the band's ear for both great grooves and tunes, as well as forays in more streamy soul/ R&B, and other related genres.
The Phantom of the Monastery or El fantasma del convento to give it its Mexican title is a 1934 gothic horror movie from Mexican director Fernando de Fuentes (El Compadre Mendoza and ¡Vámonos con Pancho Villa!). After the huge success of Ramón Peón’s La Llorona in 1933, it was hoped that Fuentes could repeat that success with his own horror movie. Starring Enrique del Campo, Marta Roel and Carlos Villatoro, who would go on to direct Santo Vs the Zombies, it was to become a much-loved classic of early Mexican cinema.
From the late 2010s Blood for Flesh is a Mexican arthouse horror film, which is evenly peppered with moments of extremity- be it the bloody or the transgressive. It’s a decidedly murkily filmed, at times quite confusing ride- which at points seems to jump around in time scales in a rather erratic manner. Though there is certainly a grim, if puzzling pull to the whole thing, which keeps you locked in/ curious throughout the films just under hour-long runtime. Here from SRS Cinema, as part of their, extreme and unrated series- is a region free DVD release of the film, bringing together directors' commentary and interviews.
Die Valdivianische Schatten is a recent release from one of the projects connected to Valdivian Black Circle- the Chilean raw black metal/ dungeon synth collective. It’s a five-track digital download/ Ltd cassette album that serves up a ghoulishly wavering ‘n’ creepily unwell blend of dark ambience, and creepy textured noise/ vocalising, with the latter tracks adding in darkly clunking piano tones.
In The Light of Lucifer, Bearing All of My Knowledge is a CDR release collecting together the crude, often clamouring, and lo-fi experimental touched Black Metal demos of Rush Falknor- a Florida sound maker, who normally focuses on wonkier ‘n’ stuck together noise composition.
From late last year here’s a C66/ digital download wall noise split bringing together two US walled noise projects. Featured here are Thewhitehorse and Planet Shithead, and each offers up a single side-long track that highlights each project's take on the form.
The New York-based artist David Lee Myers has been a stalwart in the experimental electronic music scene since the late 1980s, producing over 50 releases and collaborating with electro pioneers like Merzbow and Asmus Tietchens.
Tomáš Niesner is an experimental musician hailing from the Czech Republic and more precisely Přerov, in the eastern part of the country- where the river Bečvou runs nearby. In September of 2020, several chemical leaks into the river caused the poisoning and subsequent annihilation of wildlife, and its natural habitat. An unprecedented catastrophe that had a profound effect on Niesner, as the river was a significant part of his youth. The Bečvou album, is his latest instalment, in his lament of these events, formulated with a serene and deeply charged ambient music form.
Here's a blu ray release of two z-budget late ’80s/ early 90’s horror films from James Bryan- the rather shambling & wonky genre hack who was behind the likes of cheapie backwoods slasher Don’t Go into The Woods, and bumbling action film Lady Street Fighter. This release is part of 101 Films new AGFA (American Genre Film Archive) series. Featured here are the two films- Jungle Trap, a shaky crossbred between The Shinning and jungle head hunting natives dread, and psychic cop action film Run Coyote Run- with the disc featuring a commentary track for Jungle Trap, and a few other things.
Three Monster Tales of Sci-Fi Terror is a two Blu Ray set from the guys at Eureka Entertainment. It takes in three films from between the ’40s and ’50s, released by Universal Studios- and as its title suggests the focus here is sci-fi horror- we have an electric man-monster, alien rocks that turn folk into stone/ grow when in contact with water, and Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde meets Neanderthal man madness. This set features new prints of the pictures, a commentary track from genre experts for each film, and a collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the films including a write-up by film scholar Craig Ian Mann.
Finnish artist Tuomas A. Laitinen has released his debut album, Sapiduz, via Öm-sound. This eclectic mix of styles and sources is a hard one to pin down, but certainly worth putting the time into. Described as "medieval music played on an interstellar journey," this album presents many challenges to the listener but definitely rewards them for their patience.
John Carter was one half of the popular songwriting duo Carter and Lewis, alongside Ken Lewis. During the 1960s, the pair wrote songs for dozens of well-known pop acts including The Flowerpot Men, Mary Hopkin, Herman’s Hermits, Brenda Lee, the Ivy League and Peter and Gordon. Also worthy of mention is the fact that he recorded film scores under the name John Shakespeare (the surname borrowed from his wife, Gill) including the horror classic The Killer’s Moon in 1976. For this album, he teamed up with prog/folk royalty in ex Fairport Convention and Jethro Tull guitarist, Martin Barre. Originally released in 1997, Spirit Flying Free has been given a new cover and new life from Talking Elephant Records.
Sylvia Rimbaud is a recently (largely) walled/textured noise focused compilation from up and coming Fort Worth Texas label Hot Fuzz. It’s an eleven-track affair- coming as either a ltd tape release or digital download- and I must say it’s a highly consistent, and well-sequenced collection.
Inclusive Secrets presents us with two forty-minute examples of punishing walled noise themed around heterosexual S &M. If you even have a passing interest in HNW I’m sure you'll be aware of Koobaatoo Asparagus- aka San Diego based noisemaker Michael Scott, as it’s one of the more super prolific names in the scene.
The rather wonderfully named My Demons Pissing In A Bucket is a new project from Flanders based noise/grim drone maker Damien De Coene. And Ammonic is the project's first crude ‘n’ blacked sonic fruit- basically what’s on offer here is extremely lo-fi, nasty, and bubbling drywalled noise- heavily nod towards the likes of early Cannibal Ritual, or maybe someone like Vomir or Dead Body Collection, at their most rough, ready, and particularly nasty.