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The common use of the idea of hauntology in music of recent years, while mainly serving to confuse its definition, does at least point to a general running out of fresh musical ideas (and ways to describe them), an ennui replacing optimistic expectation, a disappointed wistfulness for the new that never arrives. And, ‘Sadly, the future is no longer what it was’ serves as a highly suitable soundtrack as well as a succinct title for such a decline.
I have been hearing this band's name for quite a while now. I never took the time to check them out, but I was intrigued when I read about their monthly CD series on a message board somewhere. Apparently, they put out a CD every month for a year on Pica Disk and this is the July edition. I didn't know what their other material sounded like before my first few listens, but I did hear that they always made very different-sounding records and have had a wide variety of styles. It seems that I am reviewing the blown out, grind/punk, improv noisecore style that they so feverishly dabble in.
Nick Grey is obviously a very ambitious artist that I've never heard much about. There has been collaborations with such people as Charlemagne Palestine as well as Martyn Bates of Eyeless In Gaza, both of whom are on this disc, and Grey having a connection with Matt Shaw, otherwise known as "Texlahoma".
Well after not being impressed by the last Utech Records offering I had to review (being another tedious new age release,) this one turned out to be much better. The NYC duo of M. Bassett and J. Gräf prefer a more psychedelic industrial-drone approach.
Upon picking up this DIY hand assembled cd-r one might think it's just another tangent of boring drone piece(s) as the art does not paint an accurate image of what you are going to find here. The art slightly confuses, but the overall packaging is by the book a decent looking release.
'Mubomuso' is Japanese psychedelic band Aural Fit's latest effort containing 5 garage rock style freakouts.
The record label Smell the Stench from Australia, graces us with Dona Ferentes Mud Delicacy. Part Noise, part Ambient and a touch experimental is the general category. A curious release from a curious project is what we have.
Being a longtime fan of Nurse With Wound, I was excited to hear Stapleton had put together another collaborative work, and thought it fitting that he would have chosen a band from the post rock genre, though I was hitherto familiar with Larsen.
Hair on my food tapes brings us a split between italian harsh drone artist Torba from Germany and Australian noise/drone artist Dotåbåtå attractively packaged in a silver on black printed cardstock.
‘Jenseitsflugmaschine’ is a self released twenty minute slice of walled noise from the German based noise project Die Neue Zeit.
“What Thy Wilt” is a very short, sharp, atmospheric and wholly rewarding slice of sonic dread ‘n’ groan and HNW texturing. This 3inch business card release comes in at just under the four minute mark, but it really is quality over quantity here with Gluttoness showing more creativity & talent than some lessen HNW acts show in a full length release.
“Dead end Whoredom” sees this highly prolific(this is the projects 25th release since last year!) and brutal Serbian HNW project focus in more on female torture and serial killer themes, than the projects usual medical ‘n’ macabre based themes. It also sees female screams of torture being added to DBC’s ‘wall’ of sound to somewhat mixed results.
This collaborative album brings together two Italian noise acts for a releases that mixers together: Power Electronics, harsh electroinca, often dense mats of field recordings and a few touches of Harsh noise matter. The two parties involved here are the slightly playful power electronics one man project Corazzata Valdemone and Harsh noise/HNW project Fukte.
Execution Support Act is the truly nasty and unforgiving HNW project of London based noise head Hal Hutchinson. Like most HNW projects there’s an obsession linked to the project, and ESA obsession is various forms of capital punishment, human torture and Anti-humanist ideology.
2010 has seen a few large collections appear on the HNW scene; we had “Stasis: 001” on the Canadian stasis label which offered up near on five hours of ‘walled’ noise from around the world. There was the “Brainkiller” tape box set put out by Italian label Toxic Industries and this featured six hours and forty minutes of HNW from European scene. Or there was “In grim imus nocte et consumimur igni” the seven cdr set put out by Sarajevo based Harsh Noise Wall label Zvukovina, which focused again in on European HNW. But the largest collection by far of the year (or any other year for that matter) was the huge “Alone” collection which I’m reviewing now- it features ten hour long tapes worth of HNW from around the world.
Michael Duane Ferrell, the man behind the Elian project, is one of the most talented minimalist composers I have had the pleasure of hearing in quite sometime. The five lengthy tracks on this CD are bleak and dismal, yet sometimes uplifting, never necessarily depressing, but still shadowy and ambiguous which can leave you feeling a bit directionless. However, that is a good thing in this context. Any music or art of sound that is able to make me feel somewhat uncomfortable yet intrigued is a sign of quality and effectiveness.
This recording is one of many documenting the brutal yet creative noise scene in Slovakia. It's a limited edition of 30 copies, so by the time I review this it will be quite hard to find (I suppose...)
Marinos Koutsomichalis is a noise artist who actually has a PhD in music composition. This release's theme is as described in the title -- being about the malfunctions of electronics and sound equipment.
Dag Rosenqvist is a member of a post-rock group, De La Mancha. With his solo project Jasper TX he moves into a much more atmospheric.
Here we have a split from Toronto’s The Endless Blockade (formed in 2003) and The Bastard Noise (formed in 1991). Both bands have their creative feet in Electronics/ Noise. Where The Bastard Noise finds them enmeshed in a power electronic and experimental vein, The Endless Blockade has more of a Noise and Grindcore bent. Together it’s a combination that works smoothly, each complimenting the other’s strengths.
“The Princess and the Newsreporter” is the latest slice of Audrey Hepburn obsessed HNW from this Swedish based project. As with all of this projects work this is based on one of the films of Ms Hepburn career, and this time its 1953’s Roman Holiday which paired her with Gregory Peck, and told the story of a bored and sheltered princess(Hepburn) who escapes her guardians and falls in love with an American newsman(Grant) in Rome.
This perfectly recorded and mixed live recording is taken from one of Merzbow’s 2009 live sets, and it shows the Japanese god of noise in fine ‘n’ shifting form. It also finds him offering up a purely electronic based set, so those who have not being too keen on Merzbow’s recent forays into live, brutal and improvised drum based noise, this go down very well indeed.
When playing as part of Einstürzende Neubauten for the last 30 years, it could sometimes seem a little incongruous to see Alexander Hacke barechested on stage, arms windmilling around his guitar as he accompanied his more subdued and sophisticatedly besuited colleagues. So it comes as no surprise to find heavy rock a bit further to the fore throughout some of his scarce solo releases such as 2005’s Sanctuary. However, his love of the power chord has never been more explicit or unadulterated as on 'Doomed', a clear, unashamed tribute to the doom metal genre.
Seasoned noisician Prurient proves with "The Black Post Society" that his talent is not limited to the idiom of noise. He is capable of truly experimental music that no longer adheres to any established aesthetic, and displays a forceful and highly unfamiliar logic. He crafts distortions with an exactitude admirable regardless of genre. Furthermore, stately, somber melody lingers patiently behind every sound on this album, tinting the harshness with gothic poeticism. The dim, meditative gulfs and intense ritual focus of dark ambient and the glorified hopelessness of black metal have been transplanted and imbued into this, harshest of all mediums, and the result is an album to facilitate high speed astral travels most any soul would find it difficult to prepare for.