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#1
Last post by P.i.L.-Lu - Today at 08:25:57 PM
Been familiar with Kalervo Palsa's art since early 90s. When I heard "Eläkeläinen muistelee" has been translated to English my immediate reaction was it is not a very good idea and I still think the same.
Finnish philosopher/cognitive scientist Tere Vaden once made a book as Kalervo Palsa at its center. Even the name and cover of the book was taken of Palsa's work. According to Vaden, Palsa's art is rooted to Finnishness in general and to northern Finland peripheral locality in particular. I think translating Palsa's written/cartoon work to other languages cannot really be understood among people outside finnish culture sphere.
It is true not many finns were into Palsa and his obscure art when he was alive. But accepting doesn't always mean understanding as disapproving doesn't always mean not understanding. Wider interest/acception of Palsa's art during the 21st century hasn't change the general attitude. Only rise of degree in ignorance and tolerance in society blurs this vision.
Palsa's art is often transgressive which can be partly so because of the northern environment both in nature and culture he lived most of his life. Sect of Lutherical Christian church, Laestadianism, organized life and power and Palsa saw through its double standards. Or perhaps he was just irreversibly opposite to normal way of life. His art was the way to take part/comment this social life where scale of topics was stretched wide from locality to problems of humanity in general.
I guess most people disagree with me, though, and that's why "Eläkeläinen muistelee" is pushed to global sphere. It's the same in selling Finnish northerness/Lapland/snow for tourists nowadays. This wholesale of northerness/winter to the world with multimillionare celebrities spreading the word in social media is just pornographic in nature: even the furthest parts of the world must be exposed and sold to masses as the world is collapsing under consumerism, climate change and biodiversity loss.
The lowest common denominator is the very key to the idea of globalism. This banality slowly eats the locality up.
But when pornography in Palsa's art was a way to question and comment on the locality Palsa loved and hated and was ultimately inseparable part of, pornography in the form of travelling industry uses places, people and way of life like bodies and literally makes people homeless when apartments serve as air B n' B accommodation instead of homes for people.
Of course, this is one extreme of continuum where everything can be reduced into profit/non-profit. But as Tere Vaden has stated, Finnishness has been retreating/vanishing for long time now, it has been on that path for centuries or even millenias. Whereas part of the 4th world and indigenous peoples, Sami People in Finland, fight for their survival, Finns literally sell themselves out to extinction.
#2
Quote from: Wainhouse on Today at 08:30:10 AMQuote from: Balor/SS1535 on Today at 07:04:03 AMQuote from: Wainhouse on Today at 06:17:04 AMMy mailbox waits for Untitled 11. In the meantime, I had a thought: are there any zines about the internet? Opinions if so?
Noise zines specifically? I don't know. But if you mean "zines" generally/broadly (and are willing to extend that to blogs----which can be sort of like zines?), then Dennis Cooper's blog is probably the best.
I did mean physical zines. Noise related or otherwise.
Why I asked for zines about the internet - it's because I suspect it unlikely that a physical zine would cover topics of experiencing things on the internet.
I'm looking at Dennis Cooper's blog, but the topics seem to be mostly art criticism and theory (at my first glance). His writing is strong, thank you for the recommendation.
I figured it wouldn't quite be what you were looking for.
(As a side note, the thing about Cooper's blog is that he doesn't really "write" any of it---aside from maybe the "escort" advertisements. The entire thing is closer to a sprawling collage of stuff he finds online and then juxtaposes in interesting ways.)
#3
Last post by Minus1 - Today at 06:07:33 PM
I very much agree with:
"...pretty much anything released in the last seven years (2009ish+) is going to, pretty much... UTTERLY FUCKING SCORCH. An improvement in the recording gear or a freeing from the echo chamber? Either way, the sound is marked by a distinct harshening of pitch, a searing viscosity that is just so much more jagged and piercing- HARSH, make no mistake..."
In my S+W musings I noted this rather distinct shift from a "softer, more muted, echoey" feel to "sharp, clean" production - the latter which I fucking adore.
#4
I would say this about Japanese P.E. a la White Hospital, Graveyard and Mothra to some extent, because Doom Engine is definitely a hit for me. I wish there was more.
#5
Last post by Minus1 - Today at 05:48:20 PM
Quote from: Bloated Slutbag on February 05, 2016, 05:59:27 PMIf Ectodurotomy is anything like Thoracia (or Acetylphasia) it is very good indeed! Great to hear that Knurl is "back", though I wouldn't say he'd ever left...
Been on serious Knurl-a-thon recently, in a way a natural progression from the Pain Jerk obsession that ruled the noisehead for a good several weeks... Natural? Yes, well, maybe. Pain Jerk, I was forced to note, is the only non-Bloor project to ever appear on Panta Rhei Recordings. I've tried real hard to find the affinity, occasionally thought I had it, gave up, decided that big man Bloor, Alan, deserved at least a few paragraphs of worship and thus... ever the spastic...
Knurl at pretty much any juncture is going to do the job, though I have a soft spot of nostalgia for a lot of the early work. The very earliest efforts- Initial Shock, Meatrag, Nervescrap- do not quite hit that sweetest of spots, nor is there all too much evidence of the knurled scrapsources that would come to to define the project- but all share a very rough-hewn, raw, aesthetic that is always to be appreciated. Tetramatrix, "the 5th Knurl cassette", is my pick from this earliest of periods... though it's hard to recall what was released (or recorded) when. As dates are only occasionally given, and perhaps only two or three tapes are chronologically numbered, I go by artwork and/or address. So, Tetramatrix: Listeners who need a little meat on their Knurl bones are advised to steer clear of Tetra as it remains firmly planted in the most severe of shriekings for the full, 90+ minute duration. I often come across criticism of Knurl's severely pitched tendencies (of, principally, the early work I assume?), but for me that is one of the project's strengths. This from a perv whose noisehead was "brought up", so to speak, by (early Alchemy-era) Incapacitants, so to complain about a lack of meat is kind of to reject a good part of what noise was then (and is still), to me, all about. Uh, yeah. I'm struggling to find words which may actually recommend Tetramatrix and frankly I no longer give a fuck. Shit is harsh, period. I know you like your pretty little asshole, but I like it more- RIPPED RAW.
Perhaps the biggest weakness of the Tetramatrix-era, especially given the amazing welded scrap monstrosities featured in live performance, is the lack of apparent metal sources in evidence. But this is soon corrected via my very favorite period: that of Hyper Flux, Diapason, and Infraneuroma. Chainmail probably belongs here too. At this juncture the steely junked sources start to bleed through, and the higher-ends start to approach something like piercing. Still the sound is very, very raw, very "primitive", very pure in the presentation, with no attempt to prettify or appeal to the more audiophilic sort of listener... and the net effects are among the most brutal of noise I've- ever- encountered. Hyper Flux kind of sets the tone for this period, but Infraneuroma really perfects the commitment to unfettered, unrelenting, screech, scraping out the dregs of all them tasty, scrapheap, flavors. Think metals dragged in shit-dirt, forced along the concrete curb, plowed into the filth-holes, repeatedly, and then just generally, viciously, hacked and slashed across the badly abused channel pan. Diapason is "the first Knurl recording using a four track" and might be a bit of an exception in that the overdriven electronics make way for exceedingly harsh acoustic banging, scraping and clanging that really brings the metal-on-metal hellbliss to life- a whole new Knurl, perhaps not one quite ready for the audiophile contingent but one clearly ready to branch out to bigger and better things.
A natural progression from Diapason is to Inelastic Scattering, which I can't for the life of me place in time- though I'd have to guess late 90's at the earliest. It is almost completely at odds with nearly all other Knurl I have encountered. Very wide stereo spectrum to highlight quite clear acoustic sources, really tapping out the potential of the stereophonic scope, and (for the first time?) evidencing the heavier depths that would become prominent in later work- a tense and frantic Knurl wailing about in a dark and echoing(!) trash compactor.
Another great period was during the early establishment of the Panta Rhei Recording label, and the standout for me: the truly epic: Paraphasm. Again a very unique piece of Knurl, "a multitrack of a piece recorded in 95" but I'd assume mixed and released a fair bit later. This is about the closest Knurl gets to Incapacitants, with maybe a bit of Macronympha's Crack tape thrown in. Multidimensional shrieking blast, pure screeching devastation all the way through. A nice bit of separation to the screeching assault, with an overarching structure one can almost pretend to understand (what harsh noise could possibly make sense over 90+ minutes of pure scorching hell??). Synovial Nematics may also have come out around this time (there's a date- Apr 97!) and shares some of the multidementional capacities of Paraphasm- but this relative brevity is practically fluffy soft by comparison, diving deep into heavier, more full-bodied thunder as to be featured at the tail-end of the cassette-era Knurl... and perhaps the first, clear, move onto proper, audiophilic, depths. December '96, meantime, saw the debut of Knurl's "extreme atmospherics" project Pyrox, though the results never quite convinced. Still an interesting experiment whose overtly harsh "droning" atmospheres would clearly inform later work.
Another anomaly from the Paraphasm period: Flat Bastard, though it is in fact recorded "in early '95". Here short blasts of very raw and brutal sound rip apart gaping silences, kind of like a finely shredded Infraneuroma, with emphasis on "ripped" and "shredded". A bit of a weirdo, kind of like Mr Bloor was listening to Kazumoto Endo and thought to himself, "Hey, them Japs have some good idears. Wonder if I could hack it?" In any case, good call Audio Dissection!
The cassette period ends with a relocation to Toronto and the release of three notables: Supravital Mephitis, Preparative Suppletion, Symbioplexus. In these, Knurl is starting to infuse his fuller bodies with experiments in dynamics and structure, while still endeavoring to retain a firm grip on the more puritannically inclined tendencies of the earlier years. Somewhat at odds, perhaps, with the stated initial aims of the project, re- "to take music and strip it entirely of what we know music to be". The sound is heavier, crunchier, and most successful in Symbioplexus – though I sometimes prefer, for reasons of my own inscrutable perversity, to treat the three tapes as parts of a single, colossal, piece, opening with Suprivital and climaxing with Symbio: massive and epic excursion into a world of dense industrial-strength demolition; Labyrinthian metal-works factory slowly, methodically, smashed, bashed, butt-raped, and slashed into tiny, twitching, bits.
The end of the 90s is the start of Knurl's graduation to digital format and a shift to less puritannical perversions. Also much fuller use of the frequency range. Metal sources gleam but more often drown in a sea of echoing effects that occasionally hit drone proper. Knurl is consciously or unconsciously appealing to a wider audience, or maybe just evolving naturally, but in any case I tend to prefer the shit back when it was stripping music of its musical values. Still a lot of interesting standouts, though my coverage at this point is far short of complete.
Vorticose (2003) was the first flat-out surprise, at times more ambient drone than harsh noise- sharp, hammering, acoustic sources more prominent than ever. Call it the sadistic, smoking hot, sister to Bloor's sweetly subdued Pholde. On closer listen, I would wager that Pholde's And With It, We Shall Divide was not only conceived in the same year (2003), but probably in the same recording session! Needless to say among the best recorded Knurls from the period, certain to please those who enjoy the sounds of steely, delayed-action, whanging. Kurtosis (2002) could also claim a similarly aligned set of fans, though the general taste is more in line with Stim's Harshnoise roster. Recorded/mixed quite differently from the other Knurls I've heard, though unmistakably the work of Mr Bloor. Very nice working over of the channel pan, approaching something like harshly-geared, ripped-to-shit, gamelon.
Thymostat was, at the time (2002), another surprise, a seeming attempt to present the project in all its many and varied possibilities, even if most of those possibilities were stuck in the realm of the crude. The edges are nice and sharp, with emphasis on contrast between the pointiest of screechings and a wide assortment of acoustic-sourced clang. At their peak, the shits get plenty harsh, but there's such a variety of mood you'd be forgiven for wondering wonder whether the dude responsible was on crack or was simply possessed of Harsh Metal-on-Metal-Whanging Incarnate.
One that I have difficultly justifying to myself: Dioculosa (2001). Not at all a fave, in fact one that I try to avoid listening to, but somehow sneaks through by virtue of being the notable anti-Tetramatrix- in that it is structurally similar (relent is not really in the cards), but concentrated almost entirely in the lower end. The scrapes and screeches are there, of course, but are mixed in deference the essential Heavy Metal Thunder. Two questions: do people still do this kind of shit- and does anyone listen to it? Kind of reminds me of latter era Cracksteel, guns blazing, exploding into space.
From the seemingly endless set of "drowned in a sea of echoing effects" submissions, I'll choose two: Traipse and Chromosytoma. To my ear, these tend shine with a little more clarity and definition, but also sound simply massive, almost comically melodramatic. This is the audiophile in me speaking, not the Knurlhead, the poor sad bastard caught between a Hasegawa and a harsh place. Huge plumes of scorched decay, mega-waves wafting infinite, the sky darkening, covered in sheets of vibrating clamor, scaffolding in continuous, bottomless, collapse. A muted brutality straining to realize the scorcheries so emphatically, and so long, lost.
Or were they? Enter, Thiocarbanid, Dichromatism, Hail Of Blades... pretty much anything released in the last seven years is going to, pretty much... UTTERLY FUCKING SCORCH. An improvement in the recording gear or a freeing from the echo chamber? Either way, the sound is marked by a distinct harshening of pitch, a searing viscosity that is just so much more jagged and piercing- HARSH, make no mistake. Generous flirtations with channel panning, ripping from earhole to earhole, constant drilling excess. By the time things like Pyrolysis and Metasynogen shoot out, one can only conclude that the project has come full circle. Is music still being stripped of all its musical values? How the fuck should I know or even care? Just bring the fucking Knurl.
Ugh. My ears are seriously fucked. Between consecutive nostalgic trips down lanes Pain Jerk and Knurl it has been an utterly awesome couple of HARSHweeks. Gonna probably spend the next three months listening, exclusively, to Thomas Koner. Goodnight. (Not that anyone can sleep with all that fucking ringing in his ears...)
OMFG, is this the greatest post ever at SI? I think it is. 😂
I shall seek out these earlier gaps in my Knurling/Pholding.
#6
Last post by Minus1 - Today at 05:32:01 PM
Well now, wtf? I found The Knurl thread! (Which has sadly been dormant for 7 years. Forgive me if there is another, newer Knurl thread that I missed.)
I'm (in)famous at S+W for making a Knurl/Pholde thread, droning on about a fuck-ton of releases, re-reviewing them, and being pretty much the only person in the thread. (In fact, now I am unable to reply to myself there! Coincidence?) 😂
I just adore the works/sound that Mr Bloor creates. Cryocarbazine, imho, is one of the very greatest Noise albums ever.
And I've also argued against the notion that with Knurl, "they are really all the same". No! To my ears, the albums offer a wide variety of textures / speeds / journeys.
As I type the newest CD Stimuli Arising Within is...er...stimulating me. 2x20min tracks.
Yeah, this is really kicking my ass. There's a beautiful, dense HNW sound in both tracks, with gradual modulation / movements. A very deep, clean sound. Some clatter appears in surface layers. I'm imagining someone microwaving a tin can of beans. 😂 Track 2 descends to the runway towards the end. I cannot be left at 40000ft. A very happy listen. I wish it was 80min.
(Edit: Well, I played it twice!) 😂
#7
Last post by Theodore - Today at 04:31:15 PM
In all honesty, even after all these posts, i struggle to understand what is noise about internet. Not anyone's fault, i guess the concept is so strange to me i cant grasp it.
Internet is a tool / medium. Each one is using it in different ways according to his needs and interests. So ? What does it mean about internet ? Our 'life' in the internet ? How we use it and spend our time in it ? Hm, dont know. From a point of view it sounds so miserable that it could be fitting. But mostly is so trivial that i would prefer untitled tracks and no artwork instead.
Really, a documented prowl on the streets maybe is trivial as subject as well - i mean, who cares about your daily life ? - but looks far more interesting and exciting than ... Browsing around porn sites.
#8
Great project, bleak old-school industrial, sometimes very basic/primitive but still extremely disturbing. I didn't know he "stole" so many samples/cuts from other artists (whose stuff is also unknown to me).
#9
ROMUN HUUTO - Joensuu
Quantus oli perunut keikan ja tilalle Edge Of Decay. Miehet paiskoi romuja särän läpi ja Olli huuteli mikrofoniin feedback & paiske juttujen oheen. Välillä jotain laitteita irtosi piuhoista ja kuultiin enemmän akuistisena kuin PA:n kautta. Ei kovin kummoisia ongelma ja lähinnä kyse siitä että noin isoilla objekteilla räimiminen tulee väistämättä PA:n yli, joka aiheuttaa hieman irtonaisuutta soundissa. Eli se efektoidun ja kuivan soundin ero. Silti asiallisesti meni!
Pyhä Sähkö oli ensimmäisellä keikalla. Alkupuolella industrial kolaus muodosti selkeän rytmin ja MS-20 mini oskilloi, lopussa tuli mieleen aika paljon Nostoväki, sillä synan hurinan päälle vedettiin hyvin sellaisia ohuita romun vinkaisuja ja kirskeitä joita Nostoväen keikoilla ollut todella paljon. Vokaalit oli todella taka-alalla miksauksessa, mutta mielestäni ei varsinaisesti haitannut. Vaikea sanoa oliko näin tarkoitus olla, ettei vokaaleista saanut selvää, mutta sieltä pystyi "aistimaan" taustalla olevan puheen jonkin sortin tekstuurina. Oikeastaan melko lyhyt keikka jossa vain kourallinen elementtejä käytössä. Ms-20 lienee suosikki syna, ja metalli romut varmasti suosikki äänilähde, ehkä niiden yleisyys pistää haastetta miten projekti saa enemmän omaa ilmettä? Oikeastaan se alkupuolen simppeli kolahdusrytmin siivittämä hurina tuntui parhaimmalta, wanhan kunnon synkän industrial noisen vibat ilmassa.
Nikama oli viikko sitten ok, mutta teknisesti paljon parantamisen varaa. Mitä lie tapahtunut viikossa, mutta nyt keikka oli oikeasti todella kova!! Volumet liukui kohdilleen nopeasti ja parin kontaktimikin ja objektin avulla tuli kovaa soiva monipuolinen harsh noise raasto, missä on sekä terävät diskantit että hienosti muljahtelevaa basso jyrähtelyä. Ei juurikaan mitään haparoivaa kokeilua. Ihan pientä säätöä loppuhuipennuksen rääkäisyjen ohella. Tämän tyyppisiä juttuja jos saisi kunnolla nauhoitettua, olisi ihan hyvä duunata jo kassujulkaisu. Joskus viime vuonna minulle tuli kysely että pitäisi saada jonnekin iltamiin noise artisti spekseillä "nainen & punk -tyyppinen eetos". Totesin silloin että Nikama varmaan sitten ainoa, ja kannattaa kysellä. Liekö tapahtumasta mitään tullut? Tämän keikan jälkeen voisi suositella noise keikoille yleisesti ottaen.
Kuullut monta juttua P.E.Packain keikoista, mutta ekaa kertaa pääsi katsomaan. Pöydällä basso ja laitteita. Pitkälti jousella soitettuja drone soundeja, jopa melodisia kuvioita, looperilla kerrostettuna ja ylimääräisistä vaijereista/kielistä aavemaisempia soundeja. Hieman perkussiivisia elementtejä ja lisäksi efektoitua laulua. Musikaalinen, mutta ei liian "musiikkia", suhteessa muihin esiintyjiin. Sopi hyvin noisen sekaan. Olin jo alkuillasta sopinut että pitäisi vihdoin näitä kassuja ottaa läjä ja kävin vielä muistuttamassa että ei pidä pakata myyntipöytää läjään liian äkkiä... mutta asia tuli mieleen vasta myöhemmin yöllä.. No uskoisin että postitse saa!
Viimeksi kun näin Keräsen keikan, oli hieman sellainen fiilis että ei oikein nyt lähde. Mies ollut sen verran kova tekijä että jotenkin päämäärätön syna kotkotus soundi sillä keikalla tuntui rimanalitukselta. Nyt keikka taas oli sitä tutumpaa tasoa! Eli Keräsellä pöytä täynnä erilaisia pedaaleita, pikkunen kajari, pikkuinen mikitetty peltilevy, intensiteetiltään kasvavaa sähköisen kuuloista hektistä soundia. Kokoajan tapahtuu pulputus, piippaus ja rutina tekstuurissa, vaikka ääni pysyttäytyy tietynlaisena massana. Jossain vaiheessa kajari kärähti rikki ja keränen paiskasi sen lattialle säpäleiksi ja jatkoi settiä ilman. Keräsen tälläisen kaman voi asettaa aika lähelle Moozzheadin meininkejä. Tietyllä tavalla myös Impakt on hieman samaan suuntaan. Estetiikkana toki kauluspaitaa ja penkillä istumista, mutta hauskalla tavalla myös penkillä istumisen voi tehdä aktiivisesti! Ei flegmaattista kyhjötystä, vaan kokoajan aktiivinen touhu. Jotenkin tuntuu että Keränen pitkään operoinut sellaisten "tavallisten noise keikkojen ulkopuolella". Toki samaa voi sanoa omistakin keikoista. Olisi cool nähdä Kerästä useammin jossain arkisemmissakin noise iltamissa!
Illan viimeisenä Umpio jonka setti oli pitkälti hyönteiselektroniikka henkistä taustalla pörräävää pulputusta ja keskiäänisen kuivahkoja kolauksia romuläjästä. Loppua kohti alkoi nousemaan elektroniikan volume, sekä romujen särön määrä. Ennenkin sanonut, mutta tuntui että se lämmittely osuus saisi olla kompaktimpi ja loppukliimaksi pidempi, heh! Nyt juuri kun alkoi tulla "jes! nyt lähtee!", ei kestänyt kuin jokunen pään nyökyttely ja setti ohi. On selvää ettei Keräsen nonstop iloittelun jälkeen ehkä kannata tehdä toista nonstop noise tulitusta perään, vaikka artisteilla on hyvin erilainen soundi, mutta... kaipasin silti lisää tulitusta, heh!
Soundit toimi, porukkaa oli todella hyvin. Veikkaan että alettiin olla jo lähempänä 50? Jos merkittävää kasvua luvassa, järkkärit joutuu kohta miettimään isompaa paikkaa! Myös sukupuolijakauma alkoi olla liki 50/50 vai olenko väärässä? Aivan helkkaristi mimmejä paikalla, myös kauempaa varta vasten tulleita. Kun keikat oli ohi, siirtyminen lähimpään baariin ja olutta kitusiin.
#10
Last post by Wainhouse - Today at 08:30:10 AM
Quote from: Balor/SS1535 on Today at 07:04:03 AMQuote from: Wainhouse on Today at 06:17:04 AMMy mailbox waits for Untitled 11. In the meantime, I had a thought: are there any zines about the internet? Opinions if so?
Noise zines specifically? I don't know. But if you mean "zines" generally/broadly (and are willing to extend that to blogs----which can be sort of like zines?), then Dennis Cooper's blog is probably the best.
I did mean physical zines. Noise related or otherwise.
Why I asked for zines about the internet - it's because I suspect it unlikely that a physical zine would cover topics of experiencing things on the internet.
I'm looking at Dennis Cooper's blog, but the topics seem to be mostly art criticism and theory (at my first glance). His writing is strong, thank you for the recommendation.
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