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Eating Guts gives the listener a punishing 100 minute shot of crude, lo-fi and old school walled noise from this German project, which is obsessed with 1980’s Italian gory cannibal movies.
This tape from Crystal Lake Tapes arrives in a very stark, almost xeroxed, black and white inlay. It contains three tracks, essentially all harsh noise walls, amounting to about half an hour; with each named after a campfire story (or rather I presume they are - I recognise one of the titles from a Tiny Tim story-piece, “The Viper”). The inlay is notably spartan and mysterious, with precious little information to offer beyond titles and artist.
Saxophonist and composer Tom Challenger has created a number of ambitious modern jazz ensembles in the last several years, notably Dice Factory, who released a self titled album of very technical fusion in 2012. His musical entity is an 8 piece called Brass Mask, likely so named for their predominantly brass instrumentation, and indeed one should expect a bright, blaring, heavily harmonized brass chorale for the entirety of this album, titled "Spy Boy".
Following spending the late nineties/early noughties as a bassist in punk rockers The Starvations, Jean-Paul Garnier has since been experimenting with the non-idiomatic use of sound “to take the listener on an experiential trip, not merely through the expectation fulfillment on which music has operated for so long, but into new territory all together,” as his website puts it.
As cliche as it is to say a band needs no introduction, DEATH needs no introduction. However, maybe some of you stumbled upon this review while researching death by leprosy. If so, good luck, and don't type too hard, you'll need your fingers for picking off the rest of your scabs. Since I've already insulted you, I might as well explain that Death is a legendary death metal (*shock*) band from Florida. Founded as Mantas by metal virtuoso Chuck Schuldiner in 1983, Death's early history was riddled with line-up changes, relocations, and frustration. In 1987, they scored a three record deal with Combat Records, and the rest is history. Their debut, Scream Bloody Gore, was met with great fan approval, and their follow up, Leprosy, cemented their place in the death metal legendarium. Now, 26 years later, Relapse is giving Leprosy the deluxe reissue it deserves (the sixth in their campaign of Death reissues).
Hungarian sound artist Ákos Garai presents Subway Budapest. The recording was recorded as a contribution to Audiotalaia net label’s Subway Sound Composition, which I can only presume is an international subway recording project.
It’s tough to find a genuinely terrible, offensively shitty black metal band. I’m actually having a tough time coming up with the last time I heard an album that actually pissed me off due to how awful it was. The vast majority of the time, the worst black metal can get is simply derivative, uneventful, and altogether boring, as is the case on Hellgoat’s 7” EP End of Man.
The Long Night is a new collaboration between US ambient legend Steve Roach, and up & coming electronic ambient artist Kelly David. The release is subtitled ‘Atmospheres for the Night Journey’, and it finds the pair creating a sixty one minute album that takes the listener on a soothing ,yet at times haunting, journey into nocturnally focused ambient mood-scaping.
Albedo 0.39 was the 8th album from this celebrated Greek electronic composer & musician. It was originally released back in 1976, and it saw the highly talented electronics whiz pushing the (then) perceived boundaries of synthesizer music by adding in complex layers of synth & other instrumentation, as well as bringing in elements of jazz fusion , symphonic prog, blues, gamelan & early dark ambience into the albums make-up.
Here’s another great split of dark ‘n’ deranged blackened US noise from Altar Of Waste- the Minneapolis based noise/drone/HNW label of Cory Strand(Fantome De Sang, Lethe, solo work, etc). This CDR brings together two Southern Californian based projects- Gnashing Of Teeth with their crumbling/ extremely lo-fi mix of blacked metal/ noise. And Static Goat with their hellish & psychedelic take on overloaded noise scaping.
“Urban Megafauna” is the 17th album from this wonky ‘n’ unwell Missouri based multi-genre project. And this 2013 release offers up fifteen slices of wacky ‘n’ deranged song craft that mixes together elements of: Off-kilter synth pop, jaunting day-glow synth melodies, crooked world music rhythms & trilingual vocals, arcade game sounds, slurred & unwell white-boy rap, male cartoon meets slight unhinged frat boy vocals, wonky IDM & off angle dips into other electronic sub-genres, and what-ever- else-they–fancy throwing in.
Here’s a short, wee tape from Svartvit. Two sides, amounting to about twelve and a half minutes of harsh skree. The title references the 1935 novel by Elias Canetti, as well as the act of proclaiming judgement on those condemned by the Spanish Inquisition; this judgement would often result in public execution by burning and indeed, the inside of the pro-inlay has such a woodcut.
Michael Blake's music is a truly 'modern' form of melodic jazz, taking the prerequisite influences from 60's hard bop and combining them with refreshingly bright and colorful synth work, noise textures, and the sort of minimalist repeating chord progressions commonly used by post rock bands these days. "In the Grand Scheme of Things" is his 5th full length since his debut in 2000.
Finland, the land of metal, all sorts, from Beherit to Lord Vicar, Lordi to Hanoi Rocks and every sub genre in between; a veritable treasure trove of metal diversity. Finnish metallers Kuolemanlaakso may be somewhat new to the metal arena (they formed in 2010), but their new album “Tulijoutsen” is a fabulous beast of a record. Members of Kuolemanlaakso are diverse too, coming from bands such as Chaosweaver, Swallow the Sun, Cult of Endtime and The Nibiruan. Tulijoutsen (Fire Swan in Finnish) lyrically was influenced by Finnish poet Aani Kouta.
Bleak Existence is a Canadian based walled noise project, and it’s one of the less prolific HNW projects working in today’s worldwide scene, putting out maybe one or two releases a year. But when it does put something out it’s always worthwhile & rewarding, and this new C70 cassette is no exception. It offers up two lengthy slices of detailed & subtle shifting walled noise that is both creative & moorish.
This split C60 cassette offers up two lengthy slices of brutalising & mostly fixed walled noise from these Serbian & Croatia based projects. Dead Body Collection will need little or no introduction to the seasoned wall-head, as this highly prolific project has released just over 100 releases since it started in 2009. Placenta Liposuction, also started off in 09 as well, but this project is a lot less prolific only releasing around a release a year for the last few years…through in all the project has put out around 18 release . This fairly recent tape is the third time these two projects have done a split release together.
German ambient experimentalists Troum are back with the third and final part to their "Power Romantic" trilogy, Mare Morphosis. The arrangements for this album were created from 2009-2013 and partly based on Bach pieces. Taking the form of one long, flowing track, Mare Morphosis builds upon Troum's already large ambient vocabulary and adds unexpected surprises to the mix. Genuinely engaging for its 50+ minute runtime, Troum's close to the "Power Romantic" trilogy should please even the most jaded listeners.
Live Malfunctions is a live 3” CD-R, self-released by U.K. based noise project Zebra Mu. For those unfamiliar, Zebra Mu is the moniker of multi-media artist Michael Ridge, also known as the head cheese of the experimental/noise label Quagga Curious Sounds. I confess, I’ve come across the name Zebra Mu several times in the noise blogosphere and probably own a release or 2 of his, but I can’t quite remember if I’ve ever given the project a fair spin. I guess it’s the occupational hazard of being a reviewer.
I’ve always felt that Horna is the weakest of Shatraug’s three main bands. That’s not to say that it’s a bad band. On the contrary, Horna has released some great material throughout the years, but in comparison to Sargeist and Behexen, Horna is often found wanting. I’m not surprised to report that Askel lähempänä Saatanaa, like much of the band’s other material, just doesn’t quite do it for me.
From late summer 2013 this three C60 cassette box set pays brutal walled noise sonic tribute to the trilogy of the Omen films. With each of the three tapes been themed around each one of the films, and each featuring a brutal yet atmospheric tinged walled noise attacks, which are edged with the odd sample from each of these classic demonic horror movies.
This is one of ESP-DISK’s fiftieth anniversary remasters - and one which I arrive at with no previous knowledge or expectations. The name Paul Bley rings a bell, as does Steve Swallow, and one of the pieces is an Ornette Coleman composition (though, again, not one I recognise); but thats the extent of my knowledge here. So, we have Bley on piano, Swallow on bass and Barry Altschul on percussion; performing ten pieces in 1965, only three of which pass the three-minute mark. Rather than being headlong bursts of freneticism, these short works are actually concise, often unhurried and reserved, performances.
Raw, noisy black metal punk, that’s the short review of Enbilulugugal. Just how do you review a release with 79 tracks; very slowly and hope that the songs are short (which blessedly most here are). Enbilulgugal were created in 2000. A plethora of releases, full length and EP follow them. Noizemongers for Goatserpent is their 2004 debut. Released as a super limited CDR back in the day by Rusty Axe label, and now re-released by Crucial Blast in a double disc remastered cd form, with extra tracks from eps, singles and demo.
I.corax are a dark/ritual charged ambient two piece from Finland, and they are part of the Helixes collective that features projects such as Halo Manash & Arktau Eos. The material on Cella Phantasma dates from 1999, but has only recently re- surfaced, and the release takes in eerier & lo-fi mixers of blacked ritual tinged ambience that’s laced with more subtly noisy electro acoustic elements.
Peder Mannerfelt has been recording for years under the name The Subliminal Kid (not to be confused with DJ Spooky, That Subliminal Kid). After releasing a few singles under his own name, Digitalis give us his first full length, Lines Describing Circles. Stepping out of the dance scene, Peder goes full dark electronics on this one. It's a pretty solid release, too, hitting more marks than it misses, but it lacks the cohesion to bring it to the next level.