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Since their inception in 1994, Blut Aus Nord has consistently created ground-breaking Black Metal, they seem to be always in a state of progressing musically, atmospherically and artistically- put simply the French band have become a touchstone for creative output. Likewise is P.H.O.B.O.S. (also from France) with a heavy sound leaning towards industrial/ambient/darkwave with doom influence. The project was formed in 2000, and inspired by artists such as Voivod and Godflesh. They started as a 4 piece, but currently are manned by Frédéric Sacri. Here the two share 3 songs each on the Triunity split.
Trances & Drones is a two CD set which brings together two classic early 1980’s slices of deep ambience from the US ambient legend Robert Rich. This 2013 edition of the release is the third time this joint classic release has been reissued, and it’s easy to see why as both Trances & Drones are truly engrossing & lose-your-self-in submersion in deep ‘n’ extremely heady ambience.
Sheolic is Deadwoods final part of the Deadwood trilogy, beginning with 8 19 in 2005, followed by Ramblack in 2008. Deadwood is the one man project that began in 2002 under the name Deadwood Murder. Swedish artists Daniel Jannson is the man behind the music, he is also a member of Culted, Keplers Odd, The Ritual Inclusion of Code and past member of Blodulv.
This cd from the esteemed Chris Watson is packaged with a wealth of text and images - and so it should be, since the project comes as part of research backed by the Institute of Advanced Study, Durham University. Sometimes, I think this kind of funded work can be problematic; depending on what exactly the funders wish to see for their money… But, in this case, Watson has been allowed to work his magic; though I feel he remains somewhat restricted by the task at hand.
Originally released in 1980, Family Fodder's original "Monkey Banana Kitchen" LP is presented here with the 12" "Schizophrenia Party", and the two 7"s ("Film Music" and "The Big Dig"), on this 2014 Staubgold CD re-issue. Though I was previously unfamiliar with it, the album is something of a classic of funky early 80's experimental 'freak pop', with moments reminiscent of Talking Heads, The Birthday Party, Suicide, Gary Numan and others.
The oft cloudy murk of black metal allows for many different interpretations of a well established form. Some follow the more traditional, extreme metal bent while others try to expand the genre's boundaries in subtle, but effective, ways. Gravecode Nebula, a five (?) piece out of Salt Lake City, UT (interesting!) tweaks their heavy brand of black metal with a spacey chaos. Not drifting too far from the norm, the space and synth drones are kept in check and, for the most part, in the background. Sempiternal Void was originally released digitally in November of 2013, and received a lot of praise. With the CD/cassette release in March 2014 and a double LP forthcoming, it looks like there's no excuse to check out their debut LP.
From late 2012, this release finds this highly prolific & infamous Serbian HNW project offering up a slightly moodier & more melancholic tinged take on his normally brutally battering sound.
Funeral Fog Recordings presents Schizophrenic Genius, a new cassette featuring 2 short slabs of HNW by Jurko Haltu. Jurko hails from Malmö, Sweden and is also the Funeral Fog label runner. Well aware of the Swedes being fine purveyors of black metal,I’m curious to see how their wall noise stacks up.
This two way HNW split bringstogether a European & US based project-on the first side we have a track from Denver Colorado based Novasak, and on the flip side we have a track from French HNW legend Vomir.
Bastard Sapling’s a name I’ve heard thrown around but never gotten around to investigating. Back when Dragged from Our Restless Trance was released in 2012 I made a mental note to check it out based on the band’s name but never actually got to it. As luck would have it, these Americans have placed themselves in my sight once again with the release of a new album Instinct Is Forever.
'Shade Themes from Kairos' is far from the first collaboration between Oren Ambarchi, Stephen O'Malley and Randall Dunn. These artists have been increasingly occurring on each others releases and those of their peers to suggest a strong network of highly experimental rock that spans the globe from Ambarchi's Australia, through O'Malley's base in mainland Europe to Dunn's studio in the States. Indeed, throughout the past decade Ambarchi and Dunn have participated in numerous releases from O'Malley's Sunn O))), while O'Malley and Ambarchi also get together in Nazoranai, a power trio with Japan's Keiji Haino, and Dunn was involved in the recording of Ambarchi's triumphant solo album, 'Audience of One', released on Touch in 2012. However, this is the first explicit union of the three, promoting Dunn from his usual credit as producer or engineer.
This C60 tape is the 2nd in the revived ‘Infinity Series’, and it finds respected Texas wall-maker & searing yet creative sonic experimentalist Sean E Matzus (aka thewhitehorse) offering up two lengthy tracks of atmospheric industrial focused wall-making, that flits between both HNW & ANW.
Exivious is an instrumental heavy jazz fusion project with two Cynic alumnus in guitarist Tymon Kruidenier and fretless bassist Robin Zielhorst. With Dodecahedron guitarist Michel Nienhuis and Pestilence drummer Yuma va Eekelen to round out the picture, the quartet creates a brainy, contemplative, spiritual and upbeat sound highly reminiscent of recent rising stars such as Disperse and Animals as Leaders. "Liminal" is their second album.
Fecal Dam is a new name to me, but the black and white inlay (adorned with an inconclusive photograph of women, in some kind of dormitory) tells us that J. Landgraf is behind the project. Given that this is the same person behind the excellent Oblive and Mass Graves, expectations were high. The tape has four tracks, amounting to about fifty minutes of sound.
Belgium: chocolate, beer, waffles, Aborted. I know, the Homer Simpsons in all of you is saying, "Aborted? You can't eat that." Well, contrary to his belief, now you can! The newest release from these death metal goremeisters comes to us in a crunchy CD, a chewy LP, a nicely stacked, buttery, limited box set, and, unfortunately, an inedible digital edition. While the various editions have different goodies and bonuses, they all share one thing: blistering, gore soaked death metal.
Aaltra Records presents Horror Vacui by Norwegian experimental noise project Flesh Coffin. To my delight I discover that Flesh Coffin is another project by Andreas Brandal, whose album Turning Point I glowingly reviewed a couple weeks ago. That album had a very dark cinematic sound to it, almost like a stripped down Goblin or Tangerine Dream. Flesh Coffin or the other hand is a different beast altogether. There are certainly some commonalities between the two projects, however Brandal’s work on Horror Vacui is far more sonically grounded in the harsh noise idiom.
Concrete and Clay offers up five ‘walls’ worth of moody & creative textured noise, which falls some where between HNW & ANW. As the CDR titles suggest there’s often a very earthy & layered feel to many of the tracks presented here. Often the ‘walls’ here bring to mind images of vast yet stark ‘n’ bleak building sites busy with odd sounds, strange subterranean borrowing’s ‘n’ tunnelling’s, or weird muddy twisting of massive semi aquatic beasts. Yet for all it’s earthy, wet, and organic feel, there is often an undertone of eerier alien-ness present, which takes this release beyond just purely organic focused sound texturing.
Both Falls of Rauros and Panopticon are rising stars in the American atmospheric black metal scene following their releases of The Light that Dwells in Rotten Wood and Kentucky respectively. And, both being signed to Bindrune Recordings, a split between the two bands was almost inevitable.
This four disc CDR release finds this highly prolific & often creative Minneapolis based ambient/ drone/ HNW artists doing his sinister & brooding deep drone reinterpretation of the Halloween II soundtrack.
This four CDR box set is one of the great lost recordings of the early Harsh Noise Wall scene- it originally appeared back in 2007, and quickly sold out- it has gone onto become one of the most mentioned works connected with Vomir & the wider walled noise scene. This recent reissue appears on Victimology Records in an edition of 50 copies.
This cd comes in a very distinctive digi-pak - distinctive in the sense that its unusually unadorned: it’s plain white, except for a green bar along the top and the artist and title details. This lack of information and clutter is compensated for inside, however; with the recording information actually listing the tubes used to master individual tracks. The trio, whilst all singing from the same song sheet, come from very different starting positions with their set-ups. Nakamura coaxes a no-input mixer, Ikeda plays a SD404 (string decoder) and a DX7 (synth) and Date equips himself with toy piano, pump organ, vibraphone, piano and field recordings.
Archspire is part of a new heavily classically inspired wave of technical death metal first indicated a few years ago by bands like Obscura and Necrophagist. I have heard them compared to Braindrill, and while the percolating, sweep heavy guitar playing is similar, this band's sound is much more melodic and coherent. "The Lucid Collective" is their second album, following "All Shall Align" in 2011.
Electronic group Outer Space is back with their first release since 2012. Phantom Center 12" comes to us from Editions Mego and is the first release to showcase the group as its core duo. Comprised of Andrew Veres and John Elliot (Emeralds), Outer Space mix up a nice batch of danceable electronic music on one side and vast, bleak, space electro on the other.
Italian label Super Terrore Z presents Drukkend by HN/HNW act Doodshoofd. For this massive single track of noise, Doodshoofd utilized a minimal setup using a mixer, a few distortion pedals, an analog synth, and a bass amp. This album is an aural representation of what the artist experiences out in the public sphere.