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Tending collects together four pieces for modern ensemble by British-American composer/ guitarist James M Creed. The CD release features on its cover a monochrome photo of two figures walking along a misty mountain scape. And this is most apt, as many of the pieces have a drifting across a hazy landscape feel- where details, shape, and subtle traces of melody slowly come into view.
Flare collections together six modern classical chamber works from up-and-coming Malaysian Australian composer Sylvia Lim. Her work mixes the gloomy and emotional felt, with the lightly searing to the awkwardly bounding. This collection is relatively varied in both its sound & instrumental use
2026’s The Mortuary Assistant blends & blurs several sub-genres of horror to create a grimly heady and macabrely unpredictable ride. It focuses on a newly trained mortuary assistant's first night working solo. The film mixes creepy & lightning-striking gothic unease, are-they-going-crazy-or-not psycho thriller, occultic mystery, and demented demonic horror- which at points get quite action bound/ tense. Here from Acorn Media International is a Blu-ray release of the film.
Die Regeninsel is a collaborative drone-ambient album from two of the European masters of the form, Dirk Serries & Asmus Tietchens. Both have been actively making work for several decades- building up large but respected discographies. This is a six-track affair, with a fair amount of tonal, textural and atmospheric shift between each track- though the focus is largely dark, troubling, and grim intensity.
From the early 2000’s, The Screaming is a mix of cult-focused horror, new-age satire, and demonic creature feature. It’s an SOV film, though it’s at the mid-range of the quality/ skill side of the genre. So, while yes, it does look cheap, the acting is passable, as are the effects & the film's general execution, all with a keen sense of both creativity and entertainment. Here from the swell folks at Visual Vengeance is a recent Blu-ray reissue, featuring commentary tracks, two versions of the picture, and a CD soundtrack.
Here from VCI Entertainment, we have a dual DVD/ Blu Ray release of two low- budget creature features from the 1960s…one regards a severed alien-possessed hand, and the other subterranean slime people overtaking LA.
Soylent Green is a telling, relevant and at times troubling dystopian thriller from the early 1970’s. It shows us a future where humankind has well and truly ruined the planet- temperatures are constantly boiling, and the air is hazed/ polluted. Vegetation, plants, and trees have all but gone- as have most animals. The general public have to queue to get rationed portions of Soylent in various colours) a bland processed food, and hope in general is in very short supply. The film centres around a weary/ jaded detective played by Charlton Heston (The Omega Man, Ben-Hur) who’s investigating the death of a very wealthy man, which ends up revealing an awful truth. Here from Arrow Video- both in the UK & Stateside- is a release of the film. It comes as either a UHD or Blu-Ray, with a new 4k scan of the picture, new commentary, and archive extras.
Falling Down stands as one of the more memorable, impactful, and thought-provoking thrillers/ action films of the 1990’s. It stars buzz- cut & bespeckled Michael Douglas ( Wall Street, Fatal Attraction, The China Syndrome) as a snapped everyman ironing/ shooting out the flaws he sees in society. It’s a blend of salary-man breakdown psycho drama, societal satire, jet-back comedy, and action thriller. Here from the fine folks at Arrow Video, both in the UK & US, is a new release of the film. It’s available as either a UHD or Blu-Ray- which take in a new 4k scan, and a mix of new/ archive extras.
Exploring the interaction between a physical Ondes Martenot and a virtual reconstruction, Kr-Krr (Nathalie Forget and Gilles Aubry) fuse the haunting waves of the instrument with electronic experimentation, creating an intriguing mixture of texture and tone. Based around improvisation, the duo work together to bring this early electronic instrument into a new age, allowing its voice to shine but also giving it provenance within a modern experimental setting. Its warm, wavering voice is somewhere between a theremin and a bowed instrument; this semi-alien quality gives it a head start in melding with the more experimental electronics that make up the bulk of Nebulage's sound.
The wonderful, named Inflatable Sex Doll Of The Wastelands, is a Japanese Pink film from the late 60’s. It’s a decidedly wonky and often disorienting blend of noir, surrealism, and, of course, female flesh. Here from Deaf Crocodile is a Blu-ray release of the film, featuring a restored print, a new commentary track, and a few other new extras.
Liminal Nightmares blends billowing, baying, and droned-out wall noise with an undercarriage of uneasy, creepy, and downright horrifying found sound/ sampling.
Bouf Noise Wall finds this prolific Czech project presenting us with three ten-minute walls, all of which take a distinctly industrial twist on the genre.
Teeth is just over an hour’s worth of bubbling ‘n’ flowing laver/steam hissing walled noise from Brazil’s Kadaveric Kommando. Been the sonic equivalent of walking around the top of an active volcano.
Manque severs up two around twenty-minute tracks from this Bordeaux-based project. The first focuses on thick droning ‘n’ hacking walling. And the second is a blend of slurred bass pelt and grainy jittering.
Here’s an untitled split bringing together two of the most notable names in Russian walled noise. Train Cemetery ( aka Elektrostal’s Sergey Pakhomov), and Sleep Column( aka Ivan Sandakov). Each party offers up a single hour-long wall.
From the start, Demons of the Mind, directed by Peter Sykes, screams Hammer. But it was released in 1972, a time when legendary British studios were waning in a fast-changing horror landscape, and the strain is clear.
The Ogre of Athens is a 1957 crime drama from Greece directed by Nikos Koundouros (Young Aphrodites, 1922 and The River). The film stars Dinos Iliopoulos (The Wise Guy, Radio Moscow and Oi Kyries tis Avlis), Margarita Papageorgiou (Windfall in Athens, The Magic City and The Happy Beginning), Giannis Argyris (I Am Innocent, Dating Agency and Love and Blood), Thanasis Vengos (It’s A Mad, Mad Vengos, The Charlatan and Ulysses’ Gaze) and the enchanting Marika Lekaki in her only film role.
I Married A Strange Person is a 1997 animated feature from legendary illustrator, director and animator, Bill Plympton (Cheatin’, Guard Dog and Idiots and Angels). Plympton’s illustrations have graced the pages of some of the world’s most renowned publications, including The New York, Vogue, Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, and Penthouse, to name a few. The relatively unknown voice cast includes Charis Michelson (Bringing Out the Dead, The Wonder Boys and High Art), Tom Larson (this remains his only feature film), Richard Spore (Bringing Out the Dead, Picture Perfect and Law and Order), Chris Cooke (Better than Ever, Trust and The Unbelievable Truth), J.B. Adams (Far From Heaven, Limetown and Bear City 3) and Ruth Ray (Desecration , The Tree and an episode of Sex in the City).
Purgate is the project of Frederic Arbour, who has a background in techno music but has decided to branch out into more experimental territory with his latest music. Leavings is an album of surreal, resonant flickers, ambient feedback effects and granular synthesis for fans of minimal post-industrial soundscape artists like Nocturnal Emissions, David Lee Myers or Aube. The sound is texturally rich, with a pulsing, throbbing repetition, but there are no formal drums.
Shadows is the second album from LA-based singer/songwriter Cate Kennan. It’s a ten-track affair that blends hazy retro keyboard tones and stark ‘n’ strummed guitars with female vocals that drift between sing-song and warblingly felt. It’s an album that sits somewhere between waveringly nostalgic, off-kilter nursery rhyme vibes and warped/ unwell singer-songwriter fare.
From VCI Entertainment, here’s a dual DVD/ Blu Ray release of two classic examples of the cinematic noir form. From 1949, D.O.A regards a man trying to solve his own murder before the poison inside kills him. And 1950’s Borderline focuses on an undercover female agent trying to break into a Mexican drug smuggling ring, and ends up with more than she bargained for.
Here we have the fourth in Severin’s celebrated Danza Macabra boxset series, which focuses on European gothic horror cinema- mixing the known with the more obscure pictures.For this set, we return to Italy again- with five films dating from between the mid-sixties and early seventies. Each of the featured pictures is given a sparkling new scan, as well as a hefty selection of largely all-new extras.
UK underground thrashers, Äxe, have completed their second demo to follow up their recent support tour and festival performances. Autogeddon's appearance on cassette helps to reinforce the old-school sound and aesthetic, bringing their rough and ready metal to the masses (well, thanks to the digital version, that is). Their lo-fi approach furthers their somewhat blackened take on thrash and pumps the underground/DIY blood through the young band's veins.
First released in the late 1970s, this self-titled album is a dense ‘n’ dizzying collision between baying guitar ‘n’ honking horn instrumental music, avant jazz, modern classical music, jamming experimentation, and shifting sample dada derangement.