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Nadja are an extremely prolific act, collaborating with artists far and wide as well as releasing a plethora of solo material, this particular release is essentially a compilation of tracks lifted from vinyl releases and splits over the years and presented in double CD format on Important Records.
The charmingly named Death.Sick.Cunt is a one man Harsh noise/ HNW project from Irving Texas. “Speed Bumps” comes in the form of a c36 tape, and it offers up two side long ‘walls’ of searing & pained wall noise.
A compilation of Japanese harsh noise is probably one of the best presents anyone could give me, so I’m very happy to review this double CD released in an edition of 300 copies by the great U.K. label Hypnagogia.
Sometimes it’s not so easy to review a project when you have virtually no information to go on. Trying to find out about Café de l’Enfer was a short lesson in futility in retrospect. Other than mentions at Steinklang Industries and Cold Spring Records websites, information was extremely limited. Which is fine for us actually; it gives less focus on who is making the music and more on the actual music recorded.
“Out of Darkness” is spandex wearing, macho strutting & head banging tribute to 80’s metal, NWOBM, & cheesy stadium rock- but this is not simply a rehash or a pale re-tread of others past work. You see Pharaoh Overlörd counts among it’s number members of cult finish genre shifting krautrock inspired band Circle, so what’s on offer here is metal that has more than a few odd edges, quirks & surprises in it.
“Drunemeton” summons up a simply splendid & bizarrely grim mixture of off-kilter drum machine laced raw black metal, wavering yet dense ghoulish synth based atmospherics, and general creative yet lo-fi grimness.
“Exécution Des Hautes Oeuvres” is the bent, deranged and unwell second sonic fruits from the Roro Perrot project. The project is the side project of Romain ‘Roro’ Perrot who is better known to the world at large as Vomir- the unstoppable, extreme and black bag wearing French HNW project.
“Bouche D'Egout” presents you with a dense, inescapable, and crisply ghoulish licked slice of fairly unmoving walled noise from this great French HNW project that’s obsessed with skulls, graveyards & crypts.
The music of Telebossa, according to their bio, is meant to combine influences from Latin American and European cultures, as the members of this duo each have roots in both regions. Their self-titled 2011 debut is hugely eclectic, drawing primarily from latin lounge jazz, bossa nova and minimalist classical music. I'm no connoisseur when it comes to any of these styles, and admittedly I can't understand any of the Spanish lyrics (one of the more prominent aspects of the album), but I've still managed to get tremendous enjoyment from the clever, understated beauty of this album's labyrithine melodies, and the soothing, inviting intimacy of the entire proceeding.
John Wiese, an artist who has collaborated with such legends of the noise/improv scene as Merzbow, Wolf Eyes and Smegma returns along with fellow cohort Corydon Ronnau as part of the long running project Sissy Spacek. Previous works under this alias have heralded an onslaught of ultra cut-up digital grindcore, huge swathes and layers of undiluted and uncompromising noise, and submersion in improv- noise bound & other wise. For this effort the majority of the album could be lumped into the 'sound collage' category, non descript interference and spatial noise clash with weird murmurings and more non-linear distractions.
Providien are a dour-sounding duo from Ohio, and this is their debut album. Its smartly, but diy-style, packaged; with glued-on covers and a classy insert. It has ten named tracks across two sides of vinyl. I say “named” tracks, because “Followed By A Wraith” has a collage feel to it; certainly a track like “Salmonella Bunker Blues” is several recordings mashed together. This is a form and approach particularly dear to me; it resonates with the thinking of the early-mid ‘90s US lo-fi underground, as well as albums like “The Faust Tapes”. But where these examples of collage work were often colourful constructions, “Followed…” has a much more monochrome feel to it. Part of this is due to the content of the tracks, which draws from a fairly narrow palette of sounds and atmospheres; and part is due to the four-track production, which is used to saturate a lot of the pieces in tape distortion. This saturation, as ever, serves to reduce everything to a similar tone and colour.
Jah Excretion is a relatively new harsh noise artist from Japan. It's always a pleasure to find new material coming out of Japan- as generally the country creates some of the best and most rewarding harsh noise around. I’d heard a few tracks in the past by Jah Excretion- so when this album came through I was already quite curious about the project.
“Death To Pigs” is the second release in Sweet Solitude’s 'Shades Of Grey' series- each title in this series finds a HNW artist theme their release around a famous murder case or murders. This release finds Nightmare Castle- the normally horror & occult themed Louisiana based HNW project tattling the Tate/ LaBinca murders that were carried out by the Mason Family.
Founded in 20002, Bleiburg is the solo project of Thaglasz record label founder Stefan Rukavina. To begin to even describe Bleiburgs sound is a task within itself. Never to be one to stick to one style, Rukavina incorporates electronic, martial, dark wave and industrial into a sound collage.
“The Seven Storey Mountain” offers up a near on forty five minute slice of brooding, dark, building & heavy slice of improv seared drone matter. The release brings together three American based improvisers in the form of: Nate Wooley(Daniel Levin Quartet, Mêlée, solo work) on Amplified trumpet & tapes, Chris Corsano (Death Unit, Chikamorachi, solo work) on drums/ percussion & C Spencher Yeh(Burning Star Core & solo work) on Violin.
“The Flesh Room” is the 3rd release from Iowa based Alex Nowacki (of Boar, Phantom Rib & I watched You Die) mysterious, quite primal sounding & story based HNW project Centuries Behind A Gate.
“Bacterial Pneumonia” is the 7th release in the Infinity series- an open ended and identical artwork based collection of releases put out by Uk based Sweet Solitude label. Each volume sees a different worldwide HNW act attempting ambient and experimental forms of walled noise.
“Sad Sketches For The Monochrome Man” is the first in a series of HNW releases on Uk’s sweet Solitude records that are themed around a notorious murder cases or murders’. The series is subtitled Shades Of Grey, which nicely fits the series often grey & pained sounds, and of course it’s very fitting for the often grey & troubled lives of both the killers & their victims.
A first, uninformed listen to the mysterious short album, ‘The 1000 Softcore Tourist People Club’, is as confusing and convoluted an experience as its title suggests. Kitsch computer pop performed by orchestral plugins hurries by in 14 short, sugary instalments where pastiches of country & western hoe-downs are mashed with toytown gabba beats (‘The 1000 People Band part one’) or acid arpeggiations rise through sci-fi sound effects to form a cinematic chase theme (‘The Softcare Tourist part two’).
Belgian collective Kaboom Karavan released this modestly packaged CD, "Barra Barra" in 2011, according to discogs, only their 2nd album in 4 years of life. Their evocative, ambient take on 'new music' is perfectly suited for experimental film work.
A cdr in a plastic wallet from Authority - decorated with cryptically iconic images of rather puritan undergarments. This, combined with the titles of the release and the first track, suggests a religious theme or rumination. There’s four tracks, just shy of an hour in total duration; all of which explore quite processed noise textures and sounds.
Southern Lord Records strike back with another reissue of a classic release; in this case it’s the first album ‘proper’ from US Doom/Drone legends Sunn. Back when this was first released in 2000, Sunn were just making waves with the music press and the public at large as a result of their ‘Grim Robe Demos’ release. Back then the genre as a whole was nowhere near as saturated as it is today, initially Sunn paid homage to the band Earth and their greater use of amplifier feedback and goliath, sloth like riffs, the essence of which was brilliantly captured in the black hole that was their Grim Robe Demos. This album however, was the one which broke Sunn as a serious prospect, aside from their initial ridicule as a bit of a passing fad, ‘00 Void’ made people sit up and pay attention (or ‘lie back and absorb’ in this particular case).
“Try” is the second in series of twelve monthly three inch CDR releases that are to be 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.
“Nous Irons Plus Loin Sans Avancer Jamais” is the third release from this relatively new project from the always creative & often progressive french HNW artist Julien Skrobek. The release offers up four 10 minutes slices of often stark yet varied walled noise, and the releases title roughly translates to “We Will go Further Without ever Advancing”…which is quite a nicely bleak & hopeless title for the release.