PLAYLIST with COMMENTS/REVIEWS

[k.p.g]

Radio Wars - Radio Wars 3 (Not on Label)
Idiotic and hilariously crude CB radio arguments soundtrack my late night before it's time for lights out.  Had a pretty middling day and hearing people losing their minds over the air with some jarring cuts to it is a funny way to end things.  Like music to my ears!

[Balor/SS1535]

Radio Wars - Radio Wars 3 (Not on Label)
Idiotic and hilariously crude CB radio arguments soundtrack my late night before it's time for lights out.  Had a pretty middling day and hearing people losing their lines over with some jarring cuts to it is a funny way to end things.  Like music to my ears!

This release sounds great.  Reminds me a lot of the Shut Up Little Man! recordings based on the description!

[Johann]

but I hope you will bare with me and that it was, at least, a good listen.

I understand a personal connection to a band and how they can be an important gateway; no worries about tangents!
This listen was good actually.  Turns out it was mostly just sparse loops of Doors songs and live snippets of Jim Morrison talking.  Think someone in Tusco Embassy is responsible for this.

If i remember correctly that's a split between Aaron and this dude Forest from Detroit. I don't think Forest is regularly doing noise but might be in some art or music projects with Jimbo Easter, this is purely a recollection from like 8 or 9 years ago so I'm not claiming infallible memory.

Edit:
https://www.sikklaffter.biz/

Yes same dude. Think he's mostly an artist

[k.p.g]

Radio Wars - Radio Wars 3 (Not on Label)
Idiotic and hilariously crude CB radio arguments soundtrack my late night before it's time for lights out.  Had a pretty middling day and hearing people losing their lines over with some jarring cuts to it is a funny way to end things.  Like music to my ears!

This release sounds great.  Reminds me a lot of the Shut Up Little Man! recordings based on the description!

There's 3 volumes.  All have their own level of weirdness to them.

[FreakAnimalFinland]

LAURI AINALA "Orpokotijuhlat Saarella" CD
I knew the same titled tape, but it was live material based on this album. For some reason, ever even noticed Svart had done the LP. Only after seeing Ainala's gig at Harsh Ways Fest, I ordered some from the label. I am more familiar with Ainala's wife. Emma Ainala would be worth looking into for those wanting weird psychedelic oddities. I recommend to google her name with google picture search. It's the type of stuff one could think TIMELESS would put out as hard cover book, but I assume not so many Finn artists are well known enough around the world... I recall I may have linked her works into art section of forum? Well, old doc here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awoTRHDICAs
Anyways, mr. Ainala was more familiar to me from his other works, but these experimental and atmospheric, ritualistic industrial-soundscapes that have kind of musicality to them, yet almost abstract. Sampled choir music, slightly glitchy looping, staying "atmospheric", but escaping most of trappings of lap-top ambient type of thing. I guess it's the lo-fi source material that sets it in different league. Not sure if material was "commercial success" really, but came out as LP/CD some years ago.

[Hyena]

ATRAX MORGUE - Close to a corpse

I keep wondering if I had felt differently about AM had he not committed suicide. I'd like to  think no.

WHITEHOUSE - Live aktion 128

Youtube. Really focused. Good quality.

SKINNY PUPPY - Last rights

My favorite of theirs.

[ConcreteMascara]

Kites - Hallucination Guillotine (Load Records)
We return to the land of the "$3 Classics" to take on this disc.  There is no excuse for anyone with any remote interest in that 2000's artsy synth noise to not own this disc.  It's a fantastic intersection of beeping machines, power electronics and intense psychedelia.  While not the biggest fan of dry spoken word on noise, Kites has always managed to pull it off.  Seriously, I just saw it on Discogs for $3.  No excuses.

Haven't seen this name popup a lot the last years. I have a bunch of Kites stuff and seem him live once but i need to dig it out again to re-appreciate the project. I don't have this particular release, but i always like the unpredictability of every release in a way. Noise, folky stuff,. typical early 2000's i guess :)

Saw Kites twice way back when. Saw him in DC around the time that album came out and goddamn what a good set. I feel like this was the height of when US noise like this was derided as hipster noise, but there was nothing fake or lame about that set.

[Fistfuck Masonanie]

Shot Dog - S/T C20 (Idiopathic)

Kiran Arora and Tyler Keen (Blind Date) team up to form Shot Dog. Meaty, crunchy, and textural DOD Death Metal Americanoise. Timeless sound and they pull it off. This kind of material always benefits from being on tape. The saturation fattens it up nicely.

Shot Dog - Friday After Dark CDr (Dead Gods)

Very caustic release. The first tape felt like a very well done, but more traditional Americanoise DOD death metal crunchy affair. This one has more detail and the frequencies are in the mid to high range. Perhaps the CD format is revealing more of the details of the recordings that the first release buried in tape saturation. Not a complaint, as this is harsh on a different level. The details in the junk metal abuse are much clearer here. It also feels like there are more elements and layers at play.

Very cool to hear two of my favorite solo artists pair up for a punishing group project.

[RURAL RESISTANCE]

RWF - DER STADSTREICHER

This in an interesting tape by a German duo. Got handed this at Harsh Ways Fest in Turku and gave it a listen today. Had to put it on again right away when it was finished.

The project is centered around the works of German movie director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. The tape comes housed in a ziplock bag with a really nice quality 18 page (!!!) insert with movie stills and text in German. My German is a bit rusty so fortunately a short English translation sheet is included.

What does it sound like then? Some sampling work, some brooding synthesizers and a bit distant effected concrete sounds. I wasn't a fan of all of the synth work on side A but the tape gets better the longer you stay in its vibe. It's a pretty short cassette too which is nice. It takes skill to condense the core ideas to a shorter duration and preserve a working arc of drama.

[Fistfuck Masonanie]

Richard Ramirez + Government Alpha – Sol Suave CDr (Xerxes)

Collab album recorded live in person in Tokyo, Japan Dec. 14, 2003. Released in 2005.

Neither artist go full in on their own signature sounds and they meet somewhere in between. Not overtly harsh, each piece is fairly dynamic.

Sol Suave feels much different than a mail collaboration. Since they are performing in the same room, it sounds like they are both listening and playing off each other, actually reacting and improvising live.

If it was a jazz duo, it feels like Richard holding down the tempo as the drummer and Yoshida being the soloing sax player. For some reason, thinking of John Coltrane's Interstellar Space when listening to this just because of the interplay. There is also a great song titled, "Overflowed Jupiter" that plays into the planetary theme.

This leans closer to a more psychedelic Government Alpha sound. Richard completely veers away from any HNW or super crunchy textures and provides more foundational or complimentary sounds and let's Yoshida kind of solo and jam on most of the tracks.

A couple of the tracks are even more experimental and I would have never guessed it was Richard and Yoshida involved if put to a blindfold test.

Unique release and not what I was expecting! Would love to hear a modern day follow up.

[ConcreteMascara]

Altar Of Flies – Female LP - Peripheral (2013)

It's been many years since I've listened to this and it's been sitting in the "to listen to" pile for over a year. Harsher than I remember without being that harsh. Very tasteful, very very good. Final b-side track reminds me of Lily the Flesh or Clinic of Torture, not harsh but unsettling and curiosity piquing. Glad I finally put this one back on the turntable.

[Commander15]

SSRI – Schwarze Sonne Ritual Invocation (Filth & Violence 2016)

Got this from trade at Harsh Ways Festival, big shout out to Toni! I think that the set and the setting for the trade was really fitting for this particular album as it shares some of the industrial-ritualistic aspects that one can really witness at the Kammio when the stars are aligned.

Broken electronics humming and oscillating at the distance, amplified scrap metal resonating in the space and tortured PE vocals reciting and conjuring ehmm... ariosophic spirits when put mildly! Symphonic structure of this album combined with somber atmosphere creates an dense, ritualistic industrial feel to this album. Movements are flowing seamlessly  creating the feeling of being involved in clandestine mass for the Black Sun in some derelict industrial estate in the edge of some small Finnish town. Imagine weeds growing thru the cracks in asphalt, shoddy spraypainted pentagrams and swastikas in the walls, remnants of the broken beer bottles and dead magpie in the middle of the magical ring made of pebbles. Creepy feeling of something sinister happening but not exactly knowing what it is. Fantastic!

[Cranial Blast]

Invagination - Electronic Flesh CD (Freak Animal)

Popped this CD in today to give it a listen. The album starts out immediately chaotic, loud and fast pacing. An interesting variety of sounds to be heard throughout this album. There are some higher pitched clanging metal sounds, a lot of rumbling distortion in parts and some Interesting segments where it sounds like some parts of distortion are blending in with some of the larger metal calamities. There is vast range of sounds to be heard and some sounds tend to feel claustrophobic and at other times, more tonal and feel like they are occurring from a distance that's building this sort of an echoed sound, the loud metal banging parts are done very well with feedback sounds jumping in and out. At other times there are parts where it seems more quiet, droning and with some piercing feedback screeches. The production of this album feels pretty raw, the approach feels sort of impromtu, which adds to the overall harsh sound and atmosphere throughout this entire album.

I also like the artwork for this one. It has that early 70's vibe about it with the selected photo image as cover art. I also like how this CD was packaged in one of those skinny slim line cases, the kind that one would generally find CD singles to be housed in. I'd highly recommend this one to those whom are into K2, Incapacitants, ect. I enjoyed this album a lot with it's varied sounds and hope to hear more from this project in the future!

[k.p.g]

Nuclear Pig Shit - Farm Noise (Hospital Productions)
One of those early Hospital releases that I have been searching for at least a digital rip of for some time now.  The collab with Macronympha is great, so I figured a solo tape wouldn't be too bad either.  This tape consists of crude as hell room mic ripping with what sounds like some metal pipes.  Perhaps the tape is just so saturated from the sheer power of the pipes being hit that it sounds distorted, but it certainly does not sound like much effects were used on this.  It's rudimentary as hell, and probably was just a friend of Dom's who wanted to try the whole "making noise" thing at the time.  Still, it's good for being just that. 

[Baglady]

KIYOSHI MIZUTANI - Actual Infinity / 2 Variations CD (Ferns 2024, orig. 1990)
Been sitting on this for months without listening to it properly for some reason. Finally!
As always with Mizutani, you ask yourself "who is this for?". It's just so introverted. It's not aimless, but it just lacks every trace of intentional entertainment. I guess that's what has me coming back, haha. He's built differently, this guy. That said, this is a more accessible album than Cemetery and, especially, Inferior's Betrayal (both also heroically reissued by Ferns the last few years). Woozy tape sounds, reverb drenched cymbals and acoustic rattle, chimes, vinyl records scrathed and played very wobbly - all of this with a current of thin strangled crackling buzz and screech throughout. Sounds that just don't sit well next to eachother, yet the result is fucking elegant somehow. Points of references are few, but Speculum Fight does come to mind, although without any momentum and that sort of thing - like firing a shotgun straight into said project's Highball album. Still not spot on though, that comparison, but what can you do. Highly addictive stuff, and maybe my new favorite.

Really hope Ferns will continue reissuing rare old Mizutani releases. A true work of passion, as I can't imsgine these are flying of the shelf at all.