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Oh, how I so wanted this to knock me backwards out of my chair! The concept alone had me clawing the shinkwrap off the packaging hard enough to break a nail: a fake soundtrack for a film by Shin’ya Tsukamoto (creator of Tetsuo: The Iron Man) that is a remake of David Lynch’s Eraserhead. Even if the film didn’t exist, how could something which name- and ambience-checked two of my favorite directors and two of my favorite movies possibly miss?!
Rafael Anton Irisarri is an artist working in the field of what is variously called contemporary classical/home listening/drone/minimalism, what perhaps used to be called ambient music before that term underwent its inevitable diversification. Here on Laurence English’ label Room40 Irisarri weaves five subtle droning ambient pieces full of depth and shade.
'Generous Bandit' is a four c20 tape box set from California based HNW project Tinieblas. All this projects work is themed around Mexican drug wars ,various Mexican gangster and related folklore characters. This box set takes in particular it's influence from the legend of Jesús Malverde- a Mexican Robin Hood type character who was killed for his crimes in 1909.
“Bolt” is a C40 tape that finds the pitch black and often horror movie influenced USA project Foul offering up two side long tracks of thick, black as night and punishing wall making.
I never really cared much for jazz guitarists for the most part. I know there were some greats like Charlie Christian and Wes Montgomery. These days, however, I have yet to be turn on by any jazz guitarists, who just aren't as exciting as, say, any good rock guitarist you could name off the top of your head.
I am a long time fan of Markus Popp's Oval project, though admittedly there are a lot of albums I've never listened to. He has a rare meticulousness, but oddly I have seldom felt in the mood to sit down and listen to his music. Loosely describably as glitched-out ambient electronic listening music of the digital age or even the future. Popp's work often sounds similar to other glitch-happy artists such as Four Tet and The Books, but while those artists have often satisfied themselves clicking and popping out sing-songy, 3 and a half minute indietronic anthems complete with sampled hook, Oval has shown, with albums like "94 Diskont", that he is unafraid to remain uncompromising and minimal, not to mention unrelentingly synthetic and sterile. His experimental techniques are not only novel, but produce quite musical results. He has an ear for texture to equal that of any academic savant on the Raster Noton label that gives his music a distinct, deep sound that improves with repeated listening.
2009’s release from Hospital Productions bestows on us the 2nd full length creation from New York’s Malkuth. Only a short 36 minutes in total, but what a raw and brutal time span it is. Touching on influences such as Finnish bands Horna and Beherit, early Mayhem and bits of Antaeus, the band makes music that is excruciatingly bare and melodic at the same time.
Dekadent Aesthetix are a post black metal band from Romania, and with this their debut album they boiling up potent, shifting, grim to playful mixture of : blacked/ Goth rock, synth lined post punk rock, black metal edges, pitter patter piano, soundtrack like moments, touches of low-key electroinca and nu metal, and pretty much what every else they fancy throwing in along the way to makes this self title début so quirky, varied ,shifting and often highly rewarding listening experience .
This split cd from last year brings together two black metal acts that make grim mid-paced to slow ambient/depressive black metal with lots of sinister and slightly off-kilter synth textures. We have three tracks from the infamous and distinctive Tasmania based Striborg, and three tracks from Cheng Du, China based project Claustrophobia.
The Torture Chamber Of Mr. Sadism” finds the always worthwhile and brutally creative Italian HNW/ Harsh noise project Alo Girl (which is of course is all the work of Italian based Cristiano Renzoni- whose also the other half of Richard An Innocent Young Throat-Cutter & runs of the great Urashima label) offer up two tracks and forty two minutes worth of thick ‘n’ truly tortures HNW matter.
“Cobwebs” is a C40 tape that offers up two sides of clamouring, densely morbid, junk metal lined and shifting HNW matter from Norwegian based Hour of the wolf which of course is one of the projects of prolific & creative noise head Andreas Brandal (Flesh coffin, Museums of Sleep, Drevne Bolesti, solo work, ect).
This four-way 12 inch vinyl split offers-up a track a piece from some of the most respected, innovative and know names with-in the worlds HNW scene. We have a track a piece from: Richard Ramirez’s( who needs no introduction if you have even brief knowledge of the scene) bigfoot obsessed project Fouke, Canadian HNW & Harsh noise legend The Rita, French Unrelentingly harsh & black bag wearing Vomir, and lastly Chicago's Is and his interesting use of Harsh noise textures.
Solo Andata are an Australian duo who have been working together since 2006 and are shortly to release their 3rd album. This though is their second and gets its release on the 12K label who have done a great job of bringing to people’s attention a lot of previously unknown acts.
The Polish noise duo MAAAA have released numerous albums on different labels since their inception in 2005. 'Decay and Demoralization' brings together the projects side of two separate short run splits. And the original splits were a CDr with Torturing Nurse, called "We are so fucking harsh! You are so fucking suck!" from 2007, and the split cassette with the act called Out of Focus, which came under the vivid title 'Blood and Shit' from 2008. This CD is a pressing of 500 copies, which makes sure more people hear the sonic chaos that is MAAAA.
Following on from a split album with another demented noise terrorist Kylie Minoise, 'Super Spermatorrhea Bukkake Dance Party!!!' is Grimalkin 555's debut solo album, released by Kovorox sound and offering "nasty trash and hack exploitationoise" (artist's description) to those daring enough to give it a listen.
Exploring the possibilities of sound on tape has preoccupied Francis Dhomont since the 40s. His compositions tend to exclusively focus on the manipulation and morphological interplay of natural sounds that are ‘performed’ acousmatically, diffused across a range of loudspeakers. Approaching eighty years’ of age, Dhomont has chosen Kafka as his latest existential theme, following work that centred on the writings on mental illness by controversial psychiatrist RD Laing and the Freudian interpretations of fairy tales by Bruno Bettelheim. The sleevenotes of Études pour Kafka make it clear that these are preliminary studies for a longer, unreleased work, called Le Cri Du Choucas.
Concrete Threat are a shadowy and ultra-grim two piece project from Sweden who formed in 2006. And since then have created some of the most unforgiving, bleak and nasty HNW and tar-dark black Harsh noise you’ll ever have come across. This six tape box set brings together just shy of four hours and forty minute worth of the projects rare/ out of print work from between 2007 and 2009, and to say the least it’s a very harrowing and ultra nasty experience.
Is it strange that I can sit through a whole album of Merzbow’s wind tunnels without blinking, and yet halfway through Abstract Expression I was squirming as if I’d picked up a nasty case of scabies?
The notion that voice alone is enough to carry music is by no means a new one. The almost ominous hums of Gregorian chants and Anaasheed have already haunted our ears for centuries, yet the a capella approach has, in more recent years, also been adopted by a plethora of other artists working in a variety of genres.
The Renderers have a very scary name for a folk-rock act such as them. Makes me think of abduction and torture, or maybe I'm thinking of "rendition"... Well going back to the band, they have remastered an old album (due to bad sound) called Monsters and Miamisas...
Gigant is German for giant; and this Belgrade/Serbian based HNW project certainly live up to it’s name as they create here one long and huge sounding track of throbbing and rumbling walled matter. This is the projects first (self) released album.
The “Nocturnal Veils” title may suggest lulling and grim ambient expanses, but there’s nothing darkly soothing or grimly subtle about this C30 tape- instead it ties you down & then gives you a detailed/thick noise battering. On offer here are two sides of raging and shifting Harsh noise with some very wallish like dwells taking over large sways of each side long track.
“BAVE” is an excellent four disc CDR set that brings together a disc a piece from cream of French Harsh Noise wall scene. We have disc from each of the following here: Bördel Noïr from the west of France ,Vomir from the south of France(how could any French based compilation be with out him!), Å from north/east of France and écoute La Merde from the east of France.
“Hunts & Wars” finds this British based dark ambient meets stripped and off-kilter doom project offering up their third and most consistent release to date. With layers of ritual and military percussion, along with noise elements been added to the projects sound to create a grim and sweeping sound canvas that has moments blood stained dissonance/ noise to more subtle and uneasy dwells.