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Sumptuous, moody packaging surrounds this disc on Editions Mego: a gatefold cd wallet, made of thick card; adorned with portentous, black and white imagery. The front cover has a photograph of a large, empty room; its dimensions measured out by rhythmic patterns of floor tiles and ceiling lights. The rear panel of the gatefold has an image of large stones piled against a roughly made “brick” wall, all of which is reflected in the water alongside it; and the inside panels depict a neglected, decaying bench. The themes and ideas in these images, are all explored in the album’s one long track; the vast bulk of which is performed by Ambarchi alone.
Edward Sol is a veteran of experimental music hailing from Ukraine. I'm not familiar with his work but apparently he's been involved in a vast number of projects, and even won prizes for his movie scores
Sum of R is the duo of Reto Mader (of dark ambient group Ural Umbo) and Julia Night, who have just released their latest, "Ride Out the Waves", a short 5 track album of 30 minutes. Though similar in otherworldly gothic tone to Mader's other group, Sum of R has a greater focus on traditional instrumentation, specifically the guitar and drumset.
Marax is Eric Crowe's multifaceted output, hailing from Atlanta U.S.A. Active since the late nineties, he's delved into dark ambient, power electronics and harsh noise
The best thing about Brighton’s Diagonal is that they’ve made an arty prog record that focuses on clean sounds and energetic playing with a melodic sense of purpose. There is absolutely no trace of metal’s doom-for-doom’s-sake darkness, or space rock’s druggy, spiralling noise to conceal a lack of songs, or psych’s directionless jamming that betrays when a band would rather play live than record in a studio. (Well, except for the album closer “Capsizing,” which veers closest to the kind of soundtrack work that ‘70s prog gods were relegated to doing in the ‘80s once seriousness and long hair fell out of vogue.)
“A nice fold-out cardboard sleeve, with a cd containing boring drone improvisation.” I now have to pad this review out for a few more hundred words…
This C46 tape is a HWN tribute to one of the more cheesy & seasonal slashers 1984’s Silent Night, Deadly Night. The tape offers up two side long tracks that mix together dialogue & samples from the movie with thick & punishing yet creative walled noise.
“Game of Consequence” presents the listener with four 15 minute slices of walled noise. These are themed around Moments- A Game Of Consequence- a 1980’s text-based choose your own adventure computer game. Bad Algorithm is from Raleigh, NC in the US, and this CDR is the projects third or forth release
Despite being just 34 when LA's Rozz Williams tragically died he had already built up a surprisingly large quantity of recordings, most infamously as the leader of the post-punk horror show Christian Death. But even before he recorded that band's seminal debut, Only Theatre of Pain, in 1979 he was experimenting with less groovy, more bleak industrial textures as Premature Ejaculation (PE), initially in collaboration with performance artist Ron Athey.
This recent Untitled CDR release finds the French master of walled noise offering up just over seventeen minutes of pummelling & unforgiving HNW. The track with-in is the audio equivalent of forcing your head in side a vast sewer net work that’s engulfed by a raging whirl wind.
This CDR release brings together two half an hour plus slices of taut & brutal walled noise from this suicidal/ grim Italian HNW project.
“Head On Collision” is a four CDR set of recordings from this fairy long running high signal feedback based HNW project of Texas noise legend Richard Ramirez. Each disc here features a single near on hour long track of static texturing/ or thinner layered yet sometimes shrill tempered walled noise.
Brett Naucke is the head of Catholic Tapes, and The Visitor is his vinyl debut. Brett's output has been limited to a handful of cassettes, so I am unfamiliar with his work. The press release promises "electronic bog filled with subtle seductive melodies and eerie organic abstractions." The lack of hyperbole makes me very hopeful!
Scandinavian soundscape artists BJ Nilsen and Stilluppsteypa have an ongoing collaboration, and the LP "Góða Nótt" is the latest installment. Each side contains a single track of slowly drifting ethereal ambience, aside from a few welcome gestural moments.
Mind & Flesh is the latest solo project of Norwegian artist Anders B., whose previous forays into the world of industrial music consisted of Katabol Prosess (one self-produced cassette release in the mid-nineties) and Babyflesh (two albums on Italy’s Slaughter Prod and Norway’s Vendlus Records in 2002 and 2005 respectively). The tracks on this, his first album under the Mind & Flesh moniker, were actually recorded between 2005 and 2008 but have only seen a proper release this year thanks to the good folks at Force Majeure, a sub-label of the (rightly) famous Lille-based Nuit et Brouillard.
Mixturizer is a Spanish noise one-man band active since the mid-2000s. and their sole member is also half of the highly prolific R.O.N.F. Records.
For this, the Lisbon-based sound artist's debut full-length release, João Castro Pinto has provided several hundred words to articulate both his compositional philosophy and approach. Given the sensorial delights held within the disk, the dry, academic descriptions talking about sonifications and meta-soundscapes create a barrier to what is, essentially, dream-like collages of field recordings creatively enhanced here and there by synthetic sounds and processing.
This tape’s physical presence is nicely understated and “quiet”; the simplest of packaging - a folded sheet of thick paper, with a low-contrast xerox image of a woman’s screaming face, in a cd wallet - making it unobtrusive in appearance and size. The sounds within “II”, however, are anything but muted.
If the handful of releases under their belt is anything to go by, Australian extreme metal imprint Aurora Australis specialise in heathen-orientated metal, an appallingly generic term used to describe anything from Manowar to Wolves in the Throne Room and which conjures up images of lofty snow-clad mountains and dark, mysterious forests at best or cringe-inducing Monty Pythons recollections at worst. As you will no doubt have noticed, it’s been a while since leather-clad headbangers (especially those of the Scandinavian persuasion) discovered the evocative power of acoustic guitars and eerie intermissions but in truth, those who understand both the power of the mighty riff and the added value of ritual-ambient soundscapes are few and far between, indeed. This split release sees two young upstarts from Down Under give their version of what the genre should sound like.
Belgium based Crucifix Eye are a digital HNW project that create a dense ‘n’ swirling take on walled noise. The project’s been in existence since mid-2012, puting out seven or so mostly tape based releases. “Yokai” comes in the form of a c40, & features two side long tracks.
“Morricone In Colour” is a four CD set that brings together eight full soundtracks from the always versatile & creative Ennio Morricone. All the soundtracks featured on the set come from the late 1960’s to the early 1970’s, and taking in Giallo, arty erotica, comedy/action, arty drama, comedy camper, black comedy, and psycho drama sound tracking. The collection shows Morricone’s knack for memorable melody, dramatic composition, and the ability to work in many different musical genres.
“The First Chapter” is 9th in series of twelve monthly three inch CDR releases, which are been put out through-out 2012 by Ireland's Bored Bear Recordings. Each release in this new series offers up a debut release from one of twelve new projects that are been put together by highly influential & respected Texas noise artist Richard Ramirez.
Mortisle Elytrion is the first LP released by Ichtyor Tides, the experimental project of French artist Nikola Akileus. The combination of experimental music and poetry really shouldn't surprise anyone, as it seems everyone is an artist. Maybe they are and maybe I'm just sceptical when I sense pretension. Anyway, that's Mortisle Elytrion in a nutshell.
Parallel 41 is a collaboration between Canadian-born New York cellist Julia Kent, perhaps most famous for her rich contributions as one of Antony's Johnsons, with the Rome-based singer/sound artist Barbara De Dominici, originally from Naples.