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This split C60 brings together two side long, crusty & sleazed slice of HNW. On side one we have a track from the French king of unrelenting & unforgiving wall making Vomir, and on side two we have a track from one of the more recent Richard Ramirez project Gender Sabotage.
“Gjöll“ is a varied & darkly heady collection of tracks that weave together elements of drone, subtle organic noise based texturing, subdued ritual elements, field recordings, murky electro- acoustic texturing and doomy ambience. Jérémie Mathes is a French sound artist and this is his second release, his first release was on highly respected ghost ambient label Mystery Seas in 2010.
Richard Ramirez is probably the man with more projects and monikers in the music/ noise world than anyone else. Once in a while he uses his real name, and this "Choke On It A Little, Then Swallow" is a 3" CDR released in 30 copies by Pigdurt Productions from U.S.A.
“Glaciating 2” is an extremely lengthy & brutally unforgiving lesson in pitch black & cold sounded HNW. The release comes in the form a c95 chrome tape, and it features a single side long track per side of tape.
HCV is the new brutal, dark & seemingly ghost /paranormal themed HNW project of long term USA scenester J Cadle(Foul, ...Massacre, White Torture, I Spit On Your Grave, ect). Helping J create the huge swirling ‘n’ searing walls of noise on offer here is his current partner/girl-friend Amy Smith.
I Watched You Die is the new HNW project from Dubuque Iowa based Alex Nowacki- whose most known for his creative yet hard hitting HNW project Boar, but also has a few other projects focusing on different facets of Walled noise like Centuries Behind A Gate which focuses in on story based unmoving HNW, and Phantom Rib which focuses in on taut almost rhythmic based HNW. This new project sees Nowacki focus in on thick ‘n’ heavy low-end rumble ‘n’ batter based HNW, and this cdr is the projects first release.
The cartoony and somewhat “light” artwork of this cdr, gives absolutely no indication of the joys hidden within: “Purely Natural Abstract Radiance” is four tracks of very beautiful, very measured collage work from Chefkirk (Roger H. Smith). Created using a simple set-up of no-input mixer, microcassette, sampler and field recordings, the album constructs incredible beauty from such an apparently limiting palette.
Norweigen isolationist soundshapers Abhorrent Beauty and Jan-M Iversen have joined forces for an album of grey, detached drifts of hibernation, nondescriptly entitled "Momentum". It comes in a handmade teal cardboard sleeve with a Rorschach inkblot in deeper blue and white painted on. This color scheme matches the frigid and unforgiving arctic sound of the music. There's not much in the way of feelings or emotions in this murky, barely conscious music, but some great sounds and spaces.
This two c30 tape box set brings together four side long slices of brutal yet macabre & darkly atmospheric slabs of HNW from these two highly respected projects from the USA HNW scene. Each project has a tape a piece of material, and each tape here is highly consistent in it’s seared yet creatively atmosphere heavy ‘walls’.
The Skull Defekts are a well known Swedish noise rock band active since the early 2000s and their latest work "Peer Amid" is released by Thrill Jockey records on CD, LP and as mp3 download.
Kourosh Yaghmaei, in a perfect world, should be a name that’s already known. His story is one that is one part bittersweet and another triumphant. His background is as a Persian musician, late 60’s early 70’s Rock and Psychedelic influenced, incorporating traditional Persian scales and composition to his works; he introduced Rock/Pop music to Iran.
Carrion Black Pit is the horror themed HNW & AHNW project of São Paulo, Brazil based Elias who is most known for the great Harsh Noise /Industrial/HNW/noised-up Sword-and-Sandal soundtrack project Sleep of Ages. “Anatomy Studies” is the projects 3rd release, and just like his work with SOA’s, CBP sound is very difficult to tie into any one genre as there’s elements of creepy manipulated field recordings, horror movie soundtracking, and horror fed noise touches here amongst the Hash Noise Wall & Ambient Harsh Noise Wall Structures.
“The Eternal Present” is the 8th volume 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 world wide HNW act attempting ambient and experimental forms of walled noise. A View From Nihil is deeply nihilistic yet often creative & inventive HNW project that’s all the work of Irishman Andrew McQuaid, who now resides in Scotland. The project has put out releases ever so often since it started in 2007, and really is one of the least prolific of euro HNW scene…through what ever the project puts out is usually something rather special & this release is no different.
Ikodora '65 is a relatively new Dutch project who boils up a loud mixture of HNW & Harsh noise. The project has been in existence since 2008, but really seems to have only come into full & active existence this year as it put out most of the nine items in it’s discography in 2011. “HNW2 (Cetus)” is the projects 8th release & it comes in the form of a 3inch cdr.
Like its title implies, this latest set of recordings from Portland-based electroacoustician Daniel Menche, is about elemental violence. Apparently formed from field recordings of storms combined with “destroyed electronics”, Menche’s reliably powerful dramas here portend and portray the unstoppable destructive forces of nature.
“Untitled” is a relatively short slice of crusty, pummelling and unflinching walled noise from the French HNW maestro Vomir. On offer here is a 3inch cdr that features a single nineteen minute & thirty eight second track.
This CDR release, sporting two untitled tracks, brings us harsh noise the way it was in the 90's: chaotic, freewheeling analog improvisations with full spectrum thickness, lurching between mulched up grinds, unforgiving high pitched screech and synth bass squelches. To my ear, the sounds Novasak gets here were likely all sourced from the rich tones of a vintage synthesizer. This release is available in both tape & CDR format
Percht have put some time and effort into the packaging of this cd, which is a shame - because it immediately raises a few questions. Its dominated by woodland imagery (bark, leaves) with a spiders web on the back and a totem-like mask on the front: so far nothing dramatically interesting or troublesome.
Apes of a Cold God is the debut album by Swedish band Lovac. Although the band has been around for a bit (performing under the name Down in June as a Death in June cover band) this is their first presentation as Lovac. As far as debuts go, this is quite good. The only puzzlement one may have is trying to figure out where you’ve heard it before. Lovac is able to construct melodies that sound so familiar yet are new. Yes there is a Death in June influence (and moments that sound akin to Sagittarius and Seelenlicht too) but given their neofolk/industrial label one can hardly fault them.
An unwritten law of black metal says that if a band has GOAT spelled in their moniker then they must be good. It's almost incredible how often this assumption is right, and this is no exception: Archgoat are a legendary Finnish black metal band with a very scarce albeit extra-kvlt discography and totally lurid, perverted style and attitude.
Italian Black Metal outfit Abhor return with their fifth studio album to date via a new deal with American label Moribund Cult. Abhor’s particular strain of Black Metal is highly strung out on the theatrical side of the fence, utilising heavy amounts of keyboard throughout, with hints of gothic sensibility. Interesting you may think…and some elements are, but overall the album fails to stand up very well against the current new wave of avant-garde BM contemporaries. Trying to fit in somewhere between ‘La Masquerade Infernale’ period Arcturus with their OTT atmospherics and operatic scope and the disorientating playing style of French BM act Blut Aus Nord, Abhor give it their all, but just don’t quite come up to par.
“Digital Fire” shows a very different side to this always creative & often quirky Irish noise & HNW project. This CDR offers up a rather straight faced & atmospheric collection of noise pieces that mixes together: shifting noise drone matter, moody feedback scaping, and organic digital meets analogue noise texturing.
“Spiral (Dedicated To Chop Shop)” is the 10th in the series of twelve monthly 3 inch CDR releases that are been put out through-out 2011 by Ireland's Bored Bear Recordings. Each release in the series celebrates, pays tribute and chronicles one of the many projects of highly influential & respected Texas noise artist Richard Ramirez.
Over his 30 plus year career US ambient legend Steve Roach has released many classic, influential & highly respected slices of ambient muisc. But with-out doubt one of the most influential, often quoted and most loved recordings of Roach's career is the Quiet Music series which originally appeared in 1998. This reissue brings together all three volumes of the series for the first time, and with out a doubt it's a lush & inviting stone cold ambient classic that hasn’t dated a bit over the years.