Loading
This is harsh, seriously harsh, I’d advise having the volume low on what ever equipment you decide to inflict this on, due to the equipment life and of course your own poor ears. Imagine been inside a huge washing machine drum, that’s seething with clouds of oceanic deep static and your been sent round and round the drum, that’s what Limbs of the fawn feels like.
Isle of Dark Magick has a chilling sense of dread about it, your always wondering what going to jump out of the strange improvised folksy come ritualistic creepy air. Over it’s 70 minutes, impressive audio textures are built up from droning Jews harp, harmonica, organ dread, voices, guitar and effects, perfectly primed for reading horror novel or late night wonderings.
This is pretty breathtaking brutal stuff, raging with aggressive god hating anger, and some surprisingly tuneful and atmospheric guitar work. For a band that have been going near on twenty years, and most had written off along time ago, this seems such an invigorated take on their sound and death metal genre as a whole.
I think one of the most interesting things about Merzbow's fast growing discography, is you don’t know what your going to get next release and it always interesting, and surprising which avenue he disappear down. This collaboration find us in some unexpected places, indeed.
With Goatvarg self titled released early this year, Uk dark ambient, noise, etc label Cold spring, dipped their toe in black metal waters. With the launch of a new sublable Satanas Rex they getting fully into black metal waters, formed purely as a black metal label, Gleipnirs Smeder is its first withered black fruit.
You could argue endlessly about the necessity of the seemingly everflowing stream of performances from John Zorn’s Masada Book but this one captures a band that’s on fire. The title for this double disc couldn’t be more wellchosen, because indeed: madness it is.
The Necks having been together for near on 20 years now and offer a very unequal mix and take on jazz, drone, ambient and experimental music. Chemist is slightly different from there usual one long track album, here we are presented with three diffrent hypnotic audio snapshots, lasting 20 mins each.
Recorder out of tune is a collection of shudder inducing nightmarish audio hiccups, gruelling stretches of bile inducing sound and sour tones. Which will have you teetering on the edge of sanity and sickness; this is prime noise for unhinging minds.
I guess I never really got into Kid A or Amnesiac. The electronic elements always seemed a bit half hearted to me, a brief flirtation filtered through a band with different ideas and preferences. Because after all Radiohead are a group of highly accomplished musicians each with their own ideas on the bands sound. The electronic elements were to me always being pushed by Thom Yorke. So I guess that it’s no surprise to me that The Eraser is a brilliant album that crystallises Yorkes love for electronic textures with his trademark lyrical style.
Dj klock's third album comes across like as a wonderfully playful, audio colouring book. Rich with head nodding beat work, jazzy work outs, mellow instrumental twist and child like melodies, that taste so sweet. Along with ome clever sound manipulation. Each track feels like its own little adventure, that covers different ground from the last. High with a cute air, that you’ll either love or hate, for my part I find it an enjoyable little muilt colour trip over the rainbow and back again.
Black Boned Angels second full length is a thing of dark wonder, that slips into your mind subtle, then grows into it’s own bizarre and crushing landscape of; chanting evil monks, black whispering ambience bubbling up from the abyss, sinister skeletal keyboard ,tinkling over dieing doomy riff sidings. Simply put one of the great doom/ drone releases of this year- you just need this along with Slomo’s – the creep, then your fixed for all things atmospheric droney, and doomy.
It's been a while since I've heard any Wolfmanger or Dead Raven Choir, which of course both manly consistence of the mysterious D. Smolken (along with a few other darkened souls), who seems to appear from time to time, from the undergrowth of a dark, sickly wood. Presenting the listener and record label with flesh dark musical meat, then becoming once more one with woodland.
Flaming tongues seems the perfect title for this album, as it seems to surround you on all sides, with flaming percussion layers, that in the longer tracks seem to suck you in deeper and deeper, often as the flames die away, your left with ambient like looped smoke trails, like be pulled down endless corridors of flaming and smoking doorways.
Here we have unique release of electronic artist Akta Ebtekar, an Iranian musician that lived in San Francisco and released some stuff on the infamous Warp label. This would be a good start to get an idea of the music of Sote as it's situated in the outer fringes of what you can find in the catalogue of that label, where they would start bordering on abstract electronic music. But that's just a start.
Freak Folk. A designation I have never been particularly fond of. I mean, aren't there countless entities that are far freakier in their approach of folk than the bands and artists that are generally lumped into the category? I think so. Nevertheless, I have followed the paths of Animal Collective, Joanna Newsom, Devendra Banhart (overhyped, but a good musician) and the likes with a lot of interest. Freak Folk, apocryphal in name only, has produced a slew of good, even great albums that frequently made it to my yearlists.
John Eric Kaada makes beautiful modern instrumental work, that leans towards the soundtrack side of things. Here he uses a 22 strong orchestra, among other instrumentation and voices , creating an album full of charming ear catching melodies, and lush sound valleys to get lost in.
Sadly in the past Whale sounds have been the reserve of dodgy new age mediation/ relaxation cds . This new project/ compilation from Important records redressers the balance, seventeen artist utilizing Whale sounds (along with other deep sea sounds) in provocative, interesting and varied ways.
The Beekeepers dream offers up a selection of quirky, laid back airy and often oddly charming songs, twinkling with pop elements. All of the songs are performed and played by Freek Kinkelaar, he uses a well thought out and gentle mix of piano, synthesizer, guitars etc. To make an album to sooth and relax, ones weary souls.
Black Vomit gives us the first official release of last year collaboration between legendary Jazz improviser Anthony Braxton and Us Noise rock manglers Wolf eyes. Recorded live at the Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville.
The Gersch are grim and grimy sludgy doom with bitter hardcore elements, with a more punky take on Ozzy Osborne for vocals, this is down and dirt metal, taste of the desert and sand burnt eyes and terminal hangovers. And it’s a rather enjoyable rough and ready metal trip.
This great two-disk set brings together three soundtracks which Stelvio Cipriani wrote in the 1970's for Italian horror maestro Mario Bava. One of the soundtracks having its world premier here, it's from Bava's film Rabid Dogs, originally planned for release 1974 but that fell through.
Minazo Vol 1 finds Merzbow in a more contemplative, sad and haunting mood, than usual. He mangers to coax out some breathing taking beautiful sound swirls, from his noise tapestry, possible some of the most emotional sounds, he’s ever created.
Black Witchery brings together a trilogy of limited edition 3” cd releases from 2004. Celebrating all things darkly ocultic with three bloody slabs of seething walls of noise, that often ooze out more atmospherics and eerier filmatic creepy scapes.
This Heat were truly a one off, born from the punk/new wave era but seemly had little to connect them with their peers. They mixed surprising and bizarre rhythmic and instrumental twists and turns, falling some where between improvised and very much controlled musical form. Melding ambient, electronics, discordant guitar, jazz and modern classical elements into a form that’s been unseen since, sadly they only lasted six years as a project, but this wonderfully lush box set brings together six CD's along with a 40 page booklet, covering the recordings they made in their lifetime.