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Israeli expatriate in Berlin, Yair Etziony's 6th album is his first since his relocation to Germany. This experimental composer harnesses the darkness for his latest, Deliverance. Using many instruments, both old and new, Yair's newest composition is a thick, dark, physical slice of industrial ambiance.
The sound of Central Asia’s melting glaciers is the jumping off point for “glaciermusic” a project propagated by the Goethe – Institutes in Almaty and Tashkent to raise awareness of the impending environmental catastrophe through the visionary work of artists and musicians. The compositions on this album are inspired by the ongoing environmental crisis of the Tujuksu glacier near to the Kazakh city of Almaty. This project came to pass after an expedition to the region made a number of sound recordings of the melting ice, highly sensitive microphones were placed in crevices of the glacier and recordings were made.
The Langham Research Centre sre a British four-piece that create moody, playful, cryptic & often concise modern musique concrete & modular work. Tape Works Vol. 1 is the projects first sonic statement, coming as either a 12 inch vinyl release, CD, or tape- I’m reviewing a CDR promo version of the release.
Here we have another classy & deluxe reissue from Crysalis label of a classic 1970’s Jethro Tull album. This times it’s 1977’s Songs From The Wood, which stands sonically as one of the more formal prog rock albums from the band- but of course, with that distinctively playful & clever Tull touches.
China’s Round Eye presents their latest album Monster Vision (Sudden Death) and it is quite the doozy. Despite residing in Shanghai, most of the members are from the states. The album evidently deals with 2016 U.S. Presidential election, but (as expats) from a unique outsider’s perspective.
The album 'Harsh Times' by N.I.H.L. came out on the Geräuschmanufaktur label in mid-2016. The German label, run by Jan Warnke of such inimitable projects as Sacred Climax and J.Adolphe, has been reviewed here before and given the due respect and appreciation it deserves. This album is the only release to date from the project, the initials of which stand for 'Noise Induced Hearing Loss'. The title of the project gives us a fairly good glimpse into what we can expect from the release.
2017’s Terrifier is a stab( pun very much intended) at taking the killer clown figure, and transporting it into grimy & murky 1980’s slasher-dom. Think Nightmares In a Damage Brain, or Maniac- but with a clown & you’ll get an idea of what to expect here.
PTRKLLR is a new ‘lower-case’ project from multi project linked Seattle based noise maker Peter Keller(Geißt, Condo Horro, Bacillus, Unser Verhängnis). Anatoma Tobeyoides is the first release from the project; it came in the form of either a pro-pressed CDR or digital download, and appeared on Russian label Reason Art Records.
Here we have another collection of Russian literature themed walled noise from Bitum- which of course is one of the projects of highly prolific noise maker Sergey Pakhomov from Elektrostal- of projects Train Cemetery, Leichen Kara, etc, as well as the owner of the excellent Reason Art Records. This audio DVD/ digital release offers up three hours worth of taut 'n' tense walled noise, themed around the searing satire Heart of a Dog by Mikhail Bulgakov.
Since 2011 this US wall noise project has slowly but surely released a series of releases themed around the 80’s children fantasy film The Labyrinth. The project takes it name from the grumpy and obstinate dwarf that leads around human teen Sarah around the magical other-world of the labyrinth. The Wiseman And The Hat is the tenth, and most recent release from the project- it comes in the form of a c62 tape on Minneapolis based Altar Of Waste.
Humanity...Failing severs up two side-long slabs of battering ‘n’ blistering walled noise with a bomb-dropping & apocalyptic theme. This release appeared in early 2016 on Altar Of Waste- either as a C30 cassette, or a digital download- from Dosis Letalis band camp. I’m reviewing the physical version of the release.
November 17th saw the worldwide release of two previously Japan only Shakatak albums, Fiesta and Utopia. This 2 CD set from Secret Records is 23 tracks of British, jazz-funk-disco whizzes at their silky smoothest. Whether putting the listener in the mood for love or in the mood for dancing, Shakatak nails each approach.
This is a project hailing from the Polish port city of Gdynia. The project operates under the auspices of Artur Krychowiak, from the Polish post rock band God’s Own Prototype, and features two long tracks of ambient, experimental improv.
Canadian Jazz drummer/composer/bandleader Harris Eisenstadt has created a brilliantly intelligent hybrid of melodic and free jazz over the course of a long and prolific career, dating back to 1999. The new album "Recent Developments" is the first recording of his I've heard that isn't part of his 'Canada Day' series, which maintained a similar lineup for its four volumes. Many of the same collaborators are still present here, such as Nate Wooley on trumpet and Eivind Opsvik on string bass.
Early To Late brings together two lengthy works from two composers who blur the line between modern composition & detailed/ quiet improv. Each of the pieces here manager to be both lulling moody & angular soothing, as well as creatively eventful & involving in their unfolds.
Satan’s Cheerleaders is a tame-if-enjoyable slice of 1970’s exploration campiness, bringing together the teen sex comedy with light satanic themed horror. This is a dual format reissue of the film, which offers up a new 2k remastering & two new commentary tracks.
What is it to capture a place in sound? Ever since the advent of portable recording equipment that question has taken on a more realist tone. A question of technique perhaps, but also one of decisions, omissions and edits. The sound artist or field recorder can never abstract their presence from the midst of the subject they wish to capture. As such every sound portrait betrays a particular embodied experience of place and of listening. There is no neutrality, no objective conveying of the place in question. Rafal Kolacki appears aware of these aporias and has carved for himself a suitable standpoint from which to record his subjects without however any need for the semblance of neutrality. His previous work Hirja. Noise from the Jungle was a reportage style collection of recordings made in the refugee camp which sprung up at Calais during the height of the migration crisis in 2016. Kolacki's recordings exposed both the dire conditions in the camp but also the compassion of aid workers and solidarity and wit of the refugees themselves. This new set seems to continue along a line of flight from the Jungle camp to one of the countries from which many migrants were arriving, Ethiopia. A'Zan. Hearing Ethiopia draws its title from the Arabic word for the Islamic call to prayer and focuses the microphone upon the capital Addis Abeba.
Master Of All Times is a double CD set worth of work from the Paul Chain project. The release features a selection of eight tracks recorded in 1999, and these offer up the expect creative blend of throbbing 80’s synth scaping, experimental blues rock, and dark, at-times prog bound rock.
Any B-movie or cult film fan worth their salt will know the name Charles Band. Since the 1970’s this director, producer, writer, and publisher has been heavily involved in the B- movie market, producing near on 300 films, directing 55, and writing around 50. He was most known in the 80’s/ 90’s for his company Empire Pictures- which release such B classics such as Ghoulies, The Dungeonmaster, Terrorvision, Re-Animator and From Beyond. In the 1990’s, after the demise of Empire, he formed Full Moon Features- releasing cult fare such as the Puppet master series, Pit and the Pendulum, Castle Freak, and the Killjoy series. It Came From The Video Aisle!, is a 500-page book charting Bands career from the 1990’s up to present day- bringing together 50 exclusive interviews, honest overviews/ reviews of all his output from this period, plus a host of rare artwork, and behind the scenes pictures.
23 Treads last album 2015’s Conspicuous Unobstructed Path was somewhat of a revelation, with its angular & darkly psychedelic brand repetitive & sonically locked down neo- folk. Really giving this often cliché ridden genre a different twist & unbalancing flavour. The Ornaments( The Ghost Of Miranda) deepens their experimental & atmospherically unsettling tendencies, to create another extremely worthy trip to the outer limits of Neo-Folk.
British electronic act Colossloth is back with his second release on Cold Spring, Heathen Needles. Featuring eleven tracks of diverse but well connected electronic grimness, Colossloth defies classification and has the freedom to do compose as he chooses. Heathen Needles benefits greatly from this freedom, and Colossloth's textures and tones can be appreciated fully for what they are.
Black Metal is a genre that has always intrigued me beyond just the music. Many bands have drawn on fascinating events in history and folklore to create their own personal mythology by which they live. Much is particularly known about the Scandinavian Black Metal scene which has seen numerous attempts to catalogue its near 30 year history. Most famously Lords of Chaos: The Bloody Rise of the Satanic Metal Underground by Michael Moynihan and Didrik Søderlind, with its contentious front cover of a burning church, and more recently and less controversially Dayal Patterson’s Black Metal: Evolution of the Cult.
Here we have a double blast of caustically dense, ear-scorching, and perversely seared Harsh noise. The C40/ digital download sees the bringing together of US smut noise jam-mers Black Leather Jesus, with the often high pitched ribbed noise nastiness of Stockholm based JSH.
Here from Severin we have a much deserved & long needed reissue of the ultra-bleak, extremely harrowing, yet highly compelling British Docu-drama detailing the day(s) after the bomb drops. Originally released back in 1984, and broadcast on the BBC during the height of the cold war. Treads stands as one of the most intense & disturbing things to ever appear on TV- and it still has so much bleak power & soul-shattering impact even after all these years, which I don’t think can say about many films 30 plus years old.