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A Scream In The Streets stands as one of more sleaze ‘n’ flesh bound cop films of the 1970s. It features the expected cop banter, a slow-mo shoot-up, and a ropy car chase. But we also have a cross-dressing rapist/ killer, a comb-over S &M freak, a peeping tom, and more than a few lengthy soft-core encounters, which often just miss dropping into hardcore. Here from Severin is a Blu Ray featuring a 2k scan, and a few extras.
Cheesy euro Sharksploitation alert- here from the folks at Severin is Deep Blood, Joe D'Amato take on the genre. And boy is it a doozy, with truly wooden acting, fleeting and badly edited shark footage, dodgy locations, and dubiously plotting. Here we a region A locked Blu Ray release of the film, taking in just the film and trailer.
Dangoswch Eich Darnau Gwyn i Mi severs up eight sonic tombstones of raw ‘n’ grimly wonky blacked metal, which has a decidedly Les Légions Noires vibe to it. The tracks move between stumbling ‘n’ crudely glamouring mid-paced affairs, onto grimly coffin crawling BM, through to dank ‘n’ cracked crypt-like ambience.
Now here’s a rather originally theme for a walled noise release- Arthropleura’s- giant Millipedes, that lived on the earth between 345 to 295 million years ago. Featured here is a single thirty nine minute wall based around those many-legged Arthropods, and on the whole, it’s a rewarding trip into choppy 'n' juddering wall-craft.
Directed by the much-celebrated English filmmaker Ken Loach (Kes, The Wind that Shakes the Barley and I, Daniel Blake), Fatherland aka Singing the Blues in Red, like all of Ken’s films, has its roots in the criticism of the socio-political landscape of the time in which it was made. Loach has always ensured that his films act as an outlet for his opinions on politics and society at large. Fatherland was made in 1986, 8 years before the fall of the Berlin Wall, and follows the story of an East German singer/songwriter, Klaus Dritteman, played by musician Gerulf Pannach, whose own musical trajectory echoes that of his character, with regards to his critical stance against the oppressive East German government. In fact, it is worth considering the film as semi-autobiographical as his own life experiences informed the film’s story.
Dissonant, groovy rock band Tomahawk began in 1999, a project of Faith No More / Mr. Bungle vocalist Mike Patton and guitarist Duane Dennison (of classic noise rock band Jesus Lizard) that also included Helmet drummer John Stanier. Their last album was their 4th, Oddfellows in 2013, and so I was surprised to hear this new album, Tonic Immobility would be coming out this year in 2021.
The Russian experimental music scene features a large number of original artists and projects. But, as with any scene, there are veterans. One such person is Alexander Lebedev-Frontov, who started creating sound in the 1970’s- he’s connected to a large number of projects, one of the most famous is the industrial project Linija Mass , and experimental soundscaping venture Nikolai Sudnik. He’s also the founder and participant of many collaborative projects too, such as ZGA. In the mid 90’s he formed Vetrophonia with Nickolai N. Soundnick. Over the project's history, it's released twelve full-length albums, three singles and EPs, and one live album. Dadacophonia Dao, was originally released digitally in 2020 on the Russian label Ultrasomnambula U. In early 2021, another Russian label Zhelezobeton re-released this album in the form of a cassette.
It Doesn't Matter Where It's Solstice When You're In The Room is a wonderfully heady ‘n’ often a fairly dissonating blend of ambience, psychedelic electronica, field recordings, and general experimental texturing. The release comes in the form of an eight-track CD on the always worthy Klanggalerie.
Originally released back in 1980 Menial Disorders was the first sonic statement from UK based Industrial and experimental electro collective Alien Brains. And it’s certainly a free-flowing, largely abstract, very oppressive and at points fittingly otherworldly blend of cluttering electro texturing, broodingly grey droning scapes, and grim feedback. Think a less shaped/ defined Throbbing Gristle meets a more lose/ hazed Chrome, and you’ll get an idea of what to expect.
Originally appearing in 1997 Emisphere found Paul Chain deepening and expanding the moodier and improv-based side of his sound. With the album all but stepping away from more rock focused sound he was originally known for a blend of church organ edged dark ambient, industrial beat-scapes, and darkly theatrical improv. Here on Minotauro Records is a well-deserved reissue of the album- it comes in the form of a deluxe double CD edition.
The Stylist is vapidly woozy, macabrely neon-edged, and at points jarringly gory psycho thriller-come-skewed drama set in the world of lady’s hairdressing. Here from Arrow Video- both in the UK and USA- is a double-disc release- bringing together the film with a good selection’s extras on Blu Ray, and the films soundtrack on a CD.
Former St. Louis sludgelords, The Lion's Daughter, continue on their synth metal odyssey with their third release, Skin Show. Furthering the exploration into synth metal from Future Cult, the trio veer more into a fuller synth sound and continue to grow. Still feeling like two pieces stitched together, Skin Show is a nice album not without its lumps.
Now here is another rare/ largely unseen SOV gem mined up by the folks over at SRS Cinema. Garden Tool Massacre is a Brit 1990’s slasher that features some nicely tense POV stalking, effective moments of gore, and a young and likeable cast. Sure, it’s a little muddled in its structure, and somewhat of murky/ darkly shot in places- but hell this is SOV, and I’d go as far as to say this is one of the best low-budget 90’s slashers I’ve seen.
Ilog2 is a decidedly manic and darting record that blends together elements improv, turntabling, layered/ dense percussive work-outs, and slurred-yet-glitched electro-acoustic texturing. The release comes in the form of a twelve-track CD on Berlin’s Zarek.
Ahh, Spookies, the mother of all crazed 'n' campy 1980’s horror films. It’s a blend of folk-stuck-in-a-creepy-house caper, overpopulated creature feature and monster fed slasher- with loads of rubbery effects, red slashing gore, and a plot that barely makes sense or logic. Here from 101 Films is the UK Blu Ray release of the film- with the two-disc set taking in a bunch of extras including two feature-length docs- one about Spookies troubled production, and the other about cult British nasty video label Vipco.
The Chalk Garden is a drama, come low-key mystery from the 1960’s- that features father and daughter acting team John and Hayley Mills in two of its lead roles. Here from Powerhouse is a Blu Ray release of another difficult to peg/ bracket film- with the disc featuring a new crisp and clear scan of the picture, a new commentary track, and a good selection of extras.
Elle Vide ses Tripes is a decidedly sleazed and nasty C60 split- it brings together forking ‘n’ grinding Japanese scat-porn themed harsh noise of Citalopram Shunyata, with the unrelenting walled noise craft of Vomir. Each project takes up a side, and each severs up its distinctive take on the noise form.
Der Blutharsch are an Austrian industrial/neofolk band formed in 1996 by multi-instrumentalist Albin Julius. The band’s sound is diverse and goes way beyond the industrial/neofolk tag, incorporating influences from kosmische music, dark ambient and psychedelia into their sound. The Cosmic Trigger was originally released in 2013, however this version has been revisited, rearranged and reconstituted for a modern audience.
Here is a short tape from Mutual Aid, featuring a five-minute track each from Dosis Letalis and Beggin For Oxys. A tape this short might not look like a good purchase - particularly factoring in postage if it’s being sent from abroad - but I’ve always enjoyed hearing short noise pieces: they focus the artist/project, especially if they would normally produce much longer recordings. Whilst Beggin For Oxys is a new name for me, I’ve heard some Dosis Letalis before, and they are certainly an artist who more usually record longer works.
Here we have a C60/ digital download walled-noise split, which brings together a selection of grinding 'n' baying HNW brutality. The split finds two fifteen-minute tracks from UK based Niks, and one thirty-minute head-grinder from Dutch project Uitgeschakeld.
Karl-Henrik is a recent(ish) collaborative project bringing together Sean E. Ramirez-Matzus ( theNIGHTproduct, Black Leather Jesus, Thewhitehorse, Last Rape) and Thomas Puopolo(Scarlet Diva, Celebrity Sex, Black Leather Jesus)- it’s a wall noise project, which is themed around the work of Ingmar Bergman. This self-titled C32/ digital download is the projects first release, and it brings together two around fifteen-minute examples of aggressively spluttering ‘n’ roasting roaming walled noise.
Macha vs. Knife is a CD reissue that highlights two of the lesser heard sides of respected and high influential noise project The Rita( aka Canadian Sam McKinlay). Both tracks run around the half-an-hour mark, so we have a total runtime of one hour on the disc- and as we’ve come to expect from Mr Mckinlay it’s top-drawer noise craft.
Released in the early ’70s The Other Side of Madness was the first film to be made about the Manson family crimes. It’s a haphazard if at points rather incoherent blend of re-enactments, courtroom action, and trippy hippy action- with moments of experimentation & darts into the avant-grade. Here on the Film Detective label is a new Blu Ray/ CD release of the film, bringing together a selection of extras and CD featuring two songs from the film.
Global Village Trucking Company were a Norfolk commune living five piece-who in the early ’70s severed up a largely happy-go-lucky blend of pub rock, jaunting 70’s pop-rock, lite prog, white soul music, funk, and jam rock. Here on Cherry Reds largely prog focused Esoteric Records is Smiling Revolution- a two-CD anthology collection of the bands work- taking in eighteen tracks, which highlights the bands bright and buoyant sound, and their carefree/ relaxed genre blend.