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From the height of the popularity of the Giallo genre- here’s The Iguana with the Tongue of Fire, a pacey & fairly eventful take on the genre. The film features a plot that sees vitally everyone been a suspect, some brutal razor blade & acid bound killings, campy & often sleazed characters, and a Stelvio Cipriani score, that’s effective if a little predictable. Here from Arrow Video is Blu Ray reissue of the film- featuring a new commentary track, and a good enough selection of extras.
Here we have a double CD release of early 1970’s work from the quirky & creative pioneering US electronic duo Beaver & Krause. The disc set, on Cherry Red sub-label Righteous, brings together the projects three albums on Warner Bros- 1970’s In A Wild Sanctuary, 1971’s Gandarava, and 1972’s All Good Men- which see the pair moving from a fairly Moog heavy ecological concept album. Onto imaginary film scoring with a Hindu mythological leanings. Through to an album that moves between dramatic musical hall tunes, upbeat easy listening, 70's singer-song writer fare, and beyond.
Sult is the latest release from the highly talented Maja S.K. Ratkje- Norwegian composer, singer, genre blender & noise maker. The nine-track album sees her taking Norse folk music as a starting point- to create a work that moves from low-key & awkward harmonic grandeur, powerful & stirring vocalisations, and moody-to-playful subtle noise making.
Trondheim Jazz Orchestra is a large Norweigen jazz ensemble with recordings dating back to 2005. While the band has many ongoing members, the line up and instrumentation change for each album. For their latest album Happy Endings, they perform complex and illogical music by double bassist and composer Ole Morten Vagan. This is the first time the group has collaborated with him.
The Waste of Space Orchestra sees the melding of two heavyweights of the Finnish metal scene, psychedelic black metallers, Oranssi Pazuzu, and doom metal legends Dark Buddha Rising. Both bands hail from the Tampere region of Finland and so would seem to fit perfectly together as bandmates.
Stekkerdoos is an experimental sound art project from Dutch conceptual artist Jessie Hoefnagel, which she describes as “Dreamy noise with a touch of darkness"- utilizing Field recordings, cassette tape sampling, live vocals, drones, and beats. Her visual art is line based drawings that mainly include female figures. She began this sound project in 2017 and has released a few short run (sold out) cassettes that were available at live shows. Stekkerdoos appears to be primarily a live performance project with video projection accompaniment featuring his artwork, so listening to these tracks I am sure I do not getting the full impact of what the artist conceived- but it’s still very nice.
From the early 1980s Next Of Kin is an Australian thriller/ low key horror film that rather nicely pre-dates the recent spate of Post Horror films, with it ’s often subtle and subdued use of the genres tropes. Here from Severin is a recent Blu Ray issue of the film- that featuring a new 2k scan, and a good batch of extras.
Here’s the second doubled headed- Mondo release from Severin Films. This time we two of the more overtly leering & sleazy example of the genre. Mondo Fredo & Mondo Bizzaro, both are early American takes of the genre- and both where put together by the notorious producer/director/distributor team of Lee Frost and Bob Cresse. The release comes in either multi-region Blu ray, or DVD format- with each offering up a commentary track for each film, and a few other extras.
This rather lengthily titled release is the first physical release from Unsignified Death- a new HNW project from Thailand. The release comes in the form of a CDR/ digital download, and features a thirty-minute slab of dense, very layer active & industrial-tinged walled noise.
Multi-faceted, German artist, Hans Castrup, returns for a third time to Karlrecords. Following up 2016's Lizenzfreie Restwärme, Hans' latest, Heterogeneous Cell Information marks his first time on vinyl. Returning to the tried and true method of multi-layer compositions, this analog and digital creation skirts the line between dark ambiance, industrial, and musique concrete. This amalgamated style makes sense given Hans' varied artistic mediums, and the end result is an intriguing blend of sonic abandon.
Pale Misery are a young band from Louisiana, USA. They began their journey as a duet of musicians, but later this duet became a trio. Pale Misery defines its style as Blackened Crust. Whatever that means- but more about that later. The band are shortly going to be releasing their debut mini-album Black Candles And Gutter Scum, which they’ll release as a self-released digital album. Anyone can pre-order this from the band's bandcamp page, and get the opportunity to download the song “The Only Cure”, which will also be presented on the debut mini-album.
Zakopano Blago (Buried Treasure in English) finds respected Serbian wall noise project Dosis Letalis severing up an hours worth of highly detailed & layered static noise texturing- which as its title suggest offers up worthy sonic surprises for those willing to put in the time & the effort with the piece.
This Croatia based project is one of those walled-noise ventures that resurfaces ever so often to put out a one or two releases- with Stages Of Death we really get a bumper crop of new ‘walls’- as this release appears in the form of either a two C90 tape box set, or digital download available from Stockholm’s Ominous Recordings band camp page.
Peter Orins is a French drummer, percussionist, and composer with a foundation in the avant-garde sound art of minimalism and jazz. This is his second release experimenting with randomness and factors of chaos theory within the application of recordings and improvisation. But unlike his previous release, which focused on electronics, this is a collection of acoustic recordings...done mostly using a small drum kit and some hand percussion instruments. Although you really would not know from the recordings that a drum kit was used unless you read the liner notes.
Decameron were a progressive/folk rock band formed in Cheltenham in 1968 by guitarist/vocalists Johnny Coppin and Dave Bell. Rather bizarrely during their early days, the band were managed by Brummie comedian Jasper Carrot before they went on to sign their first recording contract with the legendary Vertigo records in 1973. Later on that same year, the band’s debut album “Say Hello to the Band” was released, and followed up a year later with “Mammoth Special”, a third album “Beyond the Light” or “Beyond the Days” was mooted before being scrapped. The band left Vertigo and released their third album “Third Light” on Transatlantic Records in 1975, this was followed up the following year by “Tomorrow’s Pantomime” their final release before the band split and the subject of this review.
Damien De Coene is a Spanish based sound creator & artist- who over the last year or so has made a name for himself creating terminally bleak drone matter(under the name of Charles Razeur), walled noise, and stark monochrome artwork that has adorned releases from the likes of Vomir, Eugene Critchley( Cory Strands ultra-bleak drone/ HNW project), and others. DWI is the first of series of self-released C60 tapes- that features hand-drawn artwork, and a sound that sits somewhere between very grim drone matter & pared-back walled noise.
José Ramón Larraz stands as one of the un-sung names of the euro-cult genre- while the likes of Jess Franco, Jean Rollin, and Joe D’Amato have seen many of their films released on DVD & Blu Ray in the last few years. The same can’t be said for Larraz, with only until recently one of his films Vampyres- been readily available & praised. Here on Arrow Video (both in the Uk & US) is a new three-film boxset that tries to start redressing this issue- the set offers up two of his brooding, at times shocking & bloody British set films from the early 70's, and a late 1970’s soft-core drama filmed in his native country Spain. The set brings together new prints of all three films, and a good selection of extras, and an 80-page book.
New Japanese Noise brings together respected Norwegian bandleader/ drummer Paal Nilssen-Love with a selection of key Japnoise figures Toshiji Mikawa (Incapacitants) & Kohei Gomi (Pain Jerk)- with the line-up been topped off by Japanese free jazz legend Akira Sakata, and Brazilian guitarist Kiko Dinucci. All to offer up a decidedly seared- yet- playful record that putts between often thick free jazz, harsh noise, and blends of the two.
Dark Ambient as a genre often stays with-in it’s set rules, but from time to time you get a release that manages to add something new & different to the form- and that’s the case with Nocturnum- the first full-length release from Sataray, after a series of collabs & mini albums
Based on the 1961 Iris Murdoch novel of the same name, A Severed Head has a very misleading title. What sounds like it should be a horror movie is actually something quite different and unique. Whilst the film does have a darkness at its core it also incorporates elements of farce and satire to tell a tale of sexual permissiveness in middle class society. Influenced heavily by Max Ophüls 1950 classic of French cinema La Ronde, A Severed Head is a bizarre and wonderful film that twists and turns throughout.
Deaf Center made their name in the mid-2000s amid a wave of artists exploring the intersections between modern classical and some the darker regions of electronic music. Their debut album Pale Ravine (2005) became a standard bearer for the style, several iterations of which were produced by artists on the Type record label from 2005 to 2010. The duo of Erik Skodvin and Otto Totland released a follow-up, Owl Splinters, in 2011, but since then - barring one short EP - the duo have primarily focussed on other projects. Low Distance is released on the boutique label Sonic Pieces.
Near Death Experience is a harrowing, often intense & at times deeply disturbing trip into the mind of American spoken word artist Bryan Lewis Saunders. This CD release appears on Ukraine's Old Captain records- taking seventeen tracks and a runtime of seventy four minutes. It’s fair to say it's one of the most troubling, at times downright unsettling & scary recordings I’ve heard in sometime.
Wanderer is the third release on Another Timbre from this Toronto based composer- it finds her severing up a selection eight hauntingly melodic yet at times sparse & melancholic works. The key sonic focuses of many of the tracks here is the piano, though other instrumentation is arranged around it in an often greatly dramatic & creative effect.
The Heights of the Reeds is a somber cinematic soundscape created by Norweigen musicians associated with the world of modern jazz, led by trumpet player and vocalist Arve Henriksen. The most audible timbres on the album are that of the trumpet and winds, but there are (sparing) orchestral touches as well, and a faint presence of ambient electronics from producer/sampler Jan Bang, which contributes to its immersive filmic quality.