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Wince – Shame
The art of bone-dry shredding. Brought spectacularly to life. Bone-dry shredding. Is that an art? It is now. The art is in the nebulous convergence of elements invading earhole: dense mass of grinding metal machine machination, scrapy, acoustic; brute rasp of searing whitewashed fubar'd capacitance, scrappy, electronic. Needless to say, a lot of shit in play. I picture Vivenza-inspired harshperv on leisurely prowl through heavy metal grinding mill, later in the privacy of own dungeon carefully extracting from the mix the any hint of rhythmic bump or bustle, laying it on thick with the straight redzoned harsh texture. The grinding scathe-scrape. The bone-dry shredding.
A precise and perspicacious parsing into component parts may well prove an edifying pursuit- or at least provide fodder for another riveting discussion on a forum dedicated to gear/tech/etc. No shame in that, but really what makes it all so spectacular is how perception is so persuasively fucked with. Okay so here we have a char-burnt breakdown into sputtering electronics, there a spot of elongated feedback bleed, around the corner a deep-dive into overworked turbines grinding themselves into oblivion. As the variegated elements converge, it's almost too easy to get lost in their brute enticements. I'm reminded of certain species of 20th century classical music, the more spectral or droning strains, where the complex clusters of instrumentation, voice and electronics obscure their origins in the rich harmonic sonorities. Here's the harshnoise answer, the rich harmonic sonorities of smoked-to-shit machinery twisting themselves through dense strands of pointedly drilling electro-gasmic brutality. The bone-dry shredding.
Bone-dry shredding: raspy, scratchy scrapes over char-burnt and blistered scorch-scapes. Bone-dry scorch scrapes. Like taking an orbital sander to a clutch of contact mics and slowly working them shits down to the bone. A tireless and fruitless effort to smooth out an endlessly regenerating host of rough edges. The tireless toil of Sisyphean harshperv intent on pushing the tools of his craft beyond their considerable capacities, whitewashed electronics mimicking metal machining instruments in hissy-fits of fevered, blister-burnt, scorchdeath.
So much at least may be said of the first two ditties, which may combine in duration to consume one side of an lp. At junctures the whitewash drops down a notch, layers get peeled back, perspective blinks in shiny enclosure of steel processing plant, cranking and grinding away. At two minutes the first spot of squealy feedback bleeds through the mechanized scrape-scape, heftier loads of industrial-strength bulge straining into view. Slowly, perceptibly, fat flatulent overbludgeon starts to crowd out the outlying slither-strains, contours acquiring more bulbous, heavily-weighted, consistency. In this perceptible shift a perceptible loss of bearings, grittier chunks trading time with half-obscured gristle-singe, occasional gaps both suggesting and denying hidden depths, broken machines in pitch-imperfect dysfunction, and the emerging perception of not having a fucking clue as to what the fuck's going on; to revel, in relief, in the fractured bliss of perceptible oblivion.
Track 2 does not immediately stray far from the table of elements first concocted, though here the metal machining instruments - or their contact mic'd surrogates - seem to have less in the way of harsharsed analog permutation to contend with. Instead, a dialog-based trading of extended intervals, the more acoustic scrapings occasioned several opportunities to shred in bone-dry contentment before a steady crumbling electro-phonic rumple-burn chokes it out. A deviation too in the more classically structured contour, the closing minutes steadily given over to a significant cranking of the overloaded capacities, roiling at the densely leavened threshold of critical mass. Setting up the main event.
Track 3, or the main event, roars out the gate with an immediate 'hole-ripping fury that does not subside for its full lp-side duration. At root, all the bone-dry shredding you could want. In effect, against its two immediate predecessors, heavier, harsher, meatier, more actively engaged in engaging the surface tensions, and much more deeply vested in the bludgeon-thunder'd grit-textures of HARSH proper. Not to mention significantly more fleshed out stereophonic scope. In a way, this is less interesting, or less challenging and easier to "get", than Tracks 1 & 2. No need to go deep with the attentions. No invitation to fruitlessly parse a dense convergence of elements. All the harsh work is done for you, as sure to appeal to the classic harshperv as to those of the more crunch-headed persuasion. Per Track 2, the classically structured aggravation of tensions, gradually building to the climactic scorchout. But it doesn't feel gradual, rather a spirited sense of being swept up in the constantly driving forward momentum, full-throttle shifting from high to high. At the fifteenth minute the final lunge for the jugular, the harsh-grip cutting off all circulation, growing airtight, uncompromising, purple-faced searing undercurrents bringing them crunch-shits home, for the team: the rumble-cratered bludger-scrunch, the ear-bleeding scour of filth-laced scorch-huff, the rasping needle-sharp drilling of painfully determined 'hole-rape, the pure and unfettered commitment to ripped raw blown chunks blowout. The bone-dry shredding.
Digest spew:
Wince seems to excel at a certain un-alloyed un-compromising commitment to char-burnt scrape texture. Bone-dry shredding, if you will. Conjure up visions of sand, or sanders, grinders. Or grinders slowly ground up. Grit, fat chunks of grit, in your eye, grit in the throat, fits of choking wheezing rasping. Grit up the crack. Fat chunks- or the teensiest particles amplified out of proportion. Here an interesting contrast of grit sanded down in steel processing plant fighting acoustic nose-dives into well-leavened steel-on-steel shriek. Monophonic predilections forcing the attentions to try to parse the variegated attempts to rip it all to shit. Then final massed homage to the Crunch God, stereo scope properly fleshed, the net bludgen-textures as full-flavored and meaty as one could pray. Bone-dry chunks of raw shredded grit. Blown chunks blowing chunks. Like momma makes it now.