PLAYLIST with COMMENTS/REVIEWS

[magnus]

Joe McPhee is one of the coolest guys around, and always up to something new. Last time i saw him was in a duo with the drummer Chris Corsano, pure brilliance!
The tapeworks have been released on 2xcd "Sound on Sound - solo 1968-1973", interesting stuff for sure. The obvious place to start would otherwise be the first two classic LPs "Nation Time" and "Underground railroad", they were re-issued a couple of years ago, before that was more heard of than heard... Also the solo-lp "Tenor" is a classic! But these are more along jazz roads, which is what i prefer, he has also done loads of work with synths/electronics etc. got a discography an arm and a leg long... The place to start with that could be "Pieces of Light", a duo LP with John Snyder on synth. But these are all 60s-70s album and he does get even better with time (not to mention more prolific), so just dig in, not everything might be great but most is.
My favorite stuff from him is the records with the group TRIO X, a great balance with free jazz and melodic style. Four new live cds was released just recently.

[acsenger]

Charlemagne Palestine/Tony Conrad - An Aural Symbiotic Mystery (CD, Sub Rosa)

Played this after hearing of Conrad's death. It's a nice collaboration, and the violin and piano blend especially nicely at times. I don't like most of Palestine's singing though (luckily there's no singing for the most part) and Conrad's violin is interesting for me as I'm still not sure if I really like that scraping droning sound it makes... Yet this somehow adds to the appeal. Looking forward to his classic album with Faust that I'll get soon.

Hecker - Sun Pandämonium (LP, Pan)

I've read reviews that this is an extreme computer music album. Well, I don't think it's particularly extreme, but what matters is it's a good album. There's lots of digital sound stretching and manipulation. Most people on this forum dislike digital sounds (I also don't like all kinds), but if someone has no problems with computer music, it's worth hearing this album.

GX Jupitter-Larsen - Big Time Crash Bang 2008 (LP, RRR)

A collage of mainly car accident sounds on side A. Side B is a bit more brutal and the sound sources aren't recognisable, at least for me. It's all pretty hypnotic and quite dense. A very good record. I assume it was released under GX's own name because The Haters is usually noise of a more distorted kind; however, there's no mistaking it's the same guy behind this release.

[cr]

Preparing myself for the workweek to come with an exquisite mixture of
SHIFT (Altamont Rising, Morose, Ruminations) and ATRAX MORGUE (New York Ripper, Lesion 22, Spasmosynthetics)  records [All hail to Urashima for these great AM reissue boxes!]

Strange enough, they all fit to my mood perfectly today!


Shift definitely should have it's place in the Canon of Power Electronics, but I'm not quite sure which one.

[Ashmonger]

Gnawed/Velvet Curtain (C45, Maniacal Hatred): Gnawed is good, though I feel he delivers his best works at his albums. Velvet Curtain is a new project I think, interesting PE, but I think there's room for development.

The Vomit Arsonist - You Will Never Get What You Deserve (C20, Dumpsterscore Home Recordings): More The Vomit Arsonist is never a bad thing. Don't really know what to say about this tape, you get what you expect and that's a good thing.

Regosphere & The Vomit Arsonist - An Inquiry Concerning The Indications Of Insanity (C20, Dumpsterscore Home Recordings): This is some calmer stuff, more gloomy. I don't know Regosphere except for the track on the TVA 7", but seeing as this stuff is quite different from TVAs stuff, I guess that's his influence?

Akhlys - Supplication (CD, Zazen Sounds/Neuropa Recordings): Re-release of this Dark Ambient album by Alcameth of Nightbringer, Akhlys has also recently released an album on Debemur Morti which is Black Metal with some Ambient pieces in between. This is good, but not the best Dark Ambient there is.

Nastrond - Celebration of the Four (CD, Zazen Sounds/Neuropa Recordings): I really like Nastrond, but never heard this before. Was a bit affraid, since Ambient side projects aren't always great, but this absolutely is. Varied approach, didn't expect to hear guitars and other sounds going more into a general "Industrial" direction. Nice surprise. Then again, not really a surprise that Nastrond delivers...

Auschwitz Symphony Orchestra - History Will Repeat Itself (CD, No Sign of Life): Exactly as expected after hearing the first demo a couple of years ago, great stuff. Too bad about the click sound that happens before a lot of the tracks.

Kali Yuga Noise - Degeneration of Our Species (tape, Bestial Burst): Short, but cool tape. Radical lyrics. Not too familiar with bands like Fear of God and Herpes (though I've been listening to them a bit lately), but I can hear that influence, it's more in that direction than 'pure' noisecore like Nihilist Commando etc.

L.J. - 167 tracks (tape, Filth&Violence): Short tape with Harsh Noise/Noisecore blasts. Short Harsh Noise blasts with feedback inbetween. Again, quite different from 'typical' noisecore. Not bad, but leaves me wanting something extra...

Deathwank/Shitnoise Bastards - Your Power Can't Save You From The Death (C15, Fastdie Records/Vile Noise)
Deathwank/Anal-a-go-go-geddon (Vile Noise)
First heard Deathwank on the split with Pissdeads and I remembered it was some pretty harsh Noisecore the way I like it, so I got those two tapes for a cheap price and both are cool. The other bands are nice too, Anal-a-go-go-geddon is pretty harsh too, sounds quite like Deathwank and for some reason I suspect it to be more or less the same guys. Shitnoise Bastards from Malaysia is at times really fast and harsh as well. Two short and sweet Noisecore tapes.

[Ashmonger]

Also this:
Invocation of Obscene Gods (CD + zine comp, Backwoods Butcher): Cool stuff overall, that True History of Grindcore article is great. Especially because a lot of parts apply to other genres as well.
Don't like everything on the comp, but there's certainly great and nice stuff such as Ride for Revenge, Antiseen, Brody's Militia (Rupture cover), Erectile Dementia, Hellstomper, CSMD (well, I'm more fascinated due to this bands weirdness than that I really think it's great) and some interesting stuff from bands I never heard about before such as Lifespite, Skullhog, Intensive Care (new band from half of The Endless Blockade apparently), Dick Panthers track which is pretty funny, The Kill and some others.

[acsenger]

I don't know Regosphere except for the track on the TVA 7"

The Regosphere/Content Nullity split tape (Claws of the Witch) is worth buying. Regosphere is sort of gloomy and restrained power electronics (although without vocals, only spoken word in track 2) with a great sense of physical space in the tracks. Content Nullity is more aggressive but still quite atmospheric, especially track 2 with its catchy synth line. A highly recommended tape.

[Andrew McIntosh]

I don't know Regosphere except for the track on the TVA 7"

The Regosphere/Content Nullity split tape (Claws of the Witch) is worth buying.

Acsenger speaks truth. Also, if you can get a copy of Regosphere's "Gutter Swarm", do it.

[Fluid Fetish]

, CSMD (well, I'm more fascinated due to this bands weirdness than that I really think it's great).

Pretty good compilation, not really into all these humor based and 'ironic' goregrind and punk bands but this band utterly baffled me. Psychedelic/experimental goregrind or grindcore or something? Trully weird. The Ride for Revenge track is much like EVERYTHING RfR has done, perfect, and worth the price of admission alone.

Still soaking up the V/A A Group of Sexual Perverts based on all your recommendations on here and for the Mania track and so far it is as good as everyone emphasized, that and the Rita/Mania split tape re-release which is going to require a review on here soon enough from me.

[FreakAnimalFinland]

ERIC LA CASA & JEAN LUC GUIONNET "Inscape. Lille-Flandres" CD
monotype rec
These guys I generally like. Very much conceptual & arty, yet simply works based on sound itself. For me, background ambient textures, with zero cheesy elements.

IRON FIST OF THE SUN "Blush" CD
Unrest
Essential reissue of one great IFOTS tape + bonus track. I've said so many times essentially the same things, so perhaps I just conclude that if you don't have tape, now you got good opportunity to fix that problem with this cd.

RU-486 "Romanian Abattoirs" CD
Destructive Industries
Also said this before, but having heard the very early RU-486 stuff, I was quite jaded about giving chance to his later works. But they have greatly improved. Few years waiting to be on "playlist", and now one could conclude it's pretty good contemporary PE. Only problems are, that this album is plagued by kind of all-stars/obvious influences. Big "featuring Slogun", "featuring Lussurian", "featuring Richard Ramirez" texts on back cover song titles. All the sudden kind of afro-noise beats and samplings of africans and such hints to hot things happening in PE at that moment. Nevertheless, in style where you could throw together F/I/T/H, later days Slogun, and bunch of clearly studio engineered non-filthy post-industrial/pe stuff, it is good for what it is.

SPASTIC COLON "Premature Release" tape
Pinch A Loaf
Humor noise, without being total slapstick. Basically, there is nothing funny about the noise itself. Just amusing titles. Neat wooden box packaging, one hour consisting 5 studio and 1 live recording. Erik Hoffman (a.k.a. mr. Pinch A Loaf & Groundfault Recordings) on electronics and metal detector. Jorge Martin on guitar and backing vocals. It is noisy, but not harsh. Droning, but hardly merely "drone". Somewhere in category of quite early CCCC perhaps? Kind of noise you rarely hear these days, so have to dig up some 1995 tapes from shelves!

FINAL SOLUTION / TRUCIDO split tape
Der Bunker
FS offers their live recordings. Prototype PE. Two synths, vocals. Obscene lyrics, some amusing speeches before songs. LESBIANS!! Of course lo-fi live recordings don't match the ultimate power of their studio 7"s, but it's stuff I always appreciate. Trucido, in a way, is very simple. Very primitive and I'd suspect most of all un-edited. This pre-Death Squad project has also done REALLY heavy and crunchy stuff, but this isn't so much that. I still like it, but I feel there are some nostalgic elements of early exposures of other Trucido works that makes impossible to judge this objectively.

[FreakAnimalFinland]

37 PINK "Corrective Justice" tape
Extreme
Obscure mid 80's postmortem. Very little information anywhere. I got this tape on Extreme label's pro-tape (white tape with bodyprints), but it seems like tape is little too short for the material. I know this tape also exists as Greyscale label version who's address is on cover. Well, minimal artwork on cover, hanged negro emerges when you fold J-card further. Rugged drum machine beats, raw electronics, overall somewhat structured songs. Not "PE", but this overall rough and fierce old school tape industrial.

THULE SOCIETY "Wiesthor" tape
Zero Cabal
I was recently mentioned there is one label planning for CD re-issue of this. Good! One of the many Ulex Xane's. B-side has fierce electronic signal that goes beyond irritating, but overall this is quite laid back and atmospheric recordings. Field recordings. Document sounds? Kind of sound collage for occult nazi mysticism.

SEX WHOLLY BELIEF / SEX HOLY DISBELIEF "inorganic" tape
Extreme
This is project of guy who runs Extreme label after Ulex. A-side is pretty minimal, but B-side gets really good. It's just couple droning electronic signals, pitching up and down, sometimes reminding even KK Null early 90's works, but from mid 80's tape-industrial perspective, hehe.. Hard to describe, but good stuff.

[FreakAnimalFinland]

ALTAR OF FLIES "The Creeping Unknown" tape
Hästen & Korset
I'm still waiting the latest LP to arrive here. Should be on it's way. Meanwhile, checking this tape from 2008, and question emerges: Why there isn't that many AOF reissues? Nobody asked? AOF doesn't want to do them? I can't be sure, but my assumption is that there could be people who'd like to hear these things. At least should be. AOF on this tape is without animal sounds. Without sounds of kids. Not any kind of "familyman locked in house" vibe (hehe...), but it sounds like walking on thin line of old school industrial noise vs. experimental music. Rough, oppressive, grim, but not aggressive. Experimental, but not goofy or that "playful". Great tape.

URE THRALL "It's All Yer' In" tape
Discorporeality
I have no memory traces how and when I have got this. Release dates back to 1995, but is collection of very earliest Ure Thrall stuff from 1985. All I have from him, at least what I can remember, is CD on Tesco. That CD was reissue as well, but 10 years later material. I remember it was ok, but perhaps more based on middle eastern terror themes than musical qualities? Well, that is 15 years ago, so don't remember that well. Perhaps time to dig that CD from shelves... Anyways, this tape, being so early works, is different. It makes me think now what Zeno Marx was talking on "economy / tapes" topic about recourcefullness. This guy, known also as member of Voice of Eye, seems not to have almost anything what would make possible to make music. On thanks list he thanks couple guys for helping out (with gear). Two tape decks and microcassette recorder in use, guy managed to pull sound quite well known from 80's tape industrial scene. Drum machine beats, blunt tape manipulations, odd noises, sound collages. Probably something recorded on microcassette walkman and then processed further. Or processed? With literally no equipment, one just had to have few ideas how to cope with the utmost minimalism. While this tape is certainly not any industrial classic, it is still exactly the kind of stuff I can listen pretty much all day everyday. As it somehow captures the essence of work based on decent ideas, rather than enabling abundance of possibilities.

[urall]

ALTAR OF FLIES "The Creeping Unknown" tape
Hästen & Korset
I'm still waiting the latest LP to arrive here. Should be on it's way. Meanwhile, checking this tape from 2008, and question emerges: Why there isn't that many AOF reissues? Nobody asked? AOF doesn't want to do them? I can't be sure, but my assumption is that there could be people who'd like to hear these things. At least should be. AOF on this tape is without animal sounds. Without sounds of kids. Not any kind of "familyman locked in house" vibe (hehe...), but it sounds like walking on thin line of old school industrial noise vs. experimental music. Rough, oppressive, grim, but not aggressive. Experimental, but not goofy or that "playful". Great tape.

Jup, listening now to the 'Emeriten' tape again which is from around the same release year i think, and it's so good it's a shame that this is ltd to 50 copies. I do however enjoy his "familyman locked in house" stuff as i can relate to that :D

[FreakAnimalFinland]

Well, as said, yet to hear bad AOF.. just so many animals/kids kind of things - at least it felt like it.

SUTCLIFFE JUGEND "Masks" CD
Old Europe Cafe
At first I was feeling like this would be really good. Electronics starts fine and vocals start pretty fierce distorted screams... but then, I just can't really get over how all the electronics lack punch. Distorted yes. Pretty good song structures/sound textures, but always like line-in fron digital multieffect to recorder. No punch, no saturation, no loudness. If one can get over that problem what has plagued most of SJ albums since late 90's, album could be promising. At least there are pretty damn grim typics such as "Safe Word Fails", "Weakling Child", "Lucky Too", etc..

Frakcja Supramuzyczna Galerii: "Nie-Galerii" ‎– Omniofonia 3xCD
Impulsy Stetoskopu
3 discs filled with 80's industrial / experimental recordings from Poland, revolving around guy called Alexander Sikora. First disc is best for me. Seems like best works he would do solo. The more people, the more it evolves into kind of improv. group feel. Lots of things happening, but not as dark and focused as his solo works. I think disc #1 alone makes this worth to have, but I'm not saying other discs would be bad. Just less noisy, less intense.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iN_CSXvyr5I

ECCLESIASTICAL SCAFFOLDING "A Book of Lies" tape
Extreme
1988 autralian obscurity. Occult sound collages. Not very noisy, but still it's good stuff to listen to. Partially re-issued on ltd 50 copies CDR back in 1999... Would be nice to see Extreme dig up their own archives, as there would be many great titles to put out on CD.

AUGUSTO KLAMM "Poisonous Fragrances" tape
1982-83 Belgian noise. Lots of short cuts, where best ones are almost like early brutal PE and some like Randy Yau who didn't have bright sound of distortion pedals. Lots of vocal noises, raw feedbacks and overall sound rubbish. Never very loud and definitely not aggressive. More like sonic rubbish. Few moments are really nice, overall 60 min tape perhaps doesn't hold its power in a way best tapes of era do.

[bitewerksMTB]

BLACK CHRISTMAS LP- creepy as hell! Perverted phone calls, grunting, screaming over Xmas carols, piano scraping. A must-own for anyone into musique concrete, cut-up, etc. This isn't the exact soundtrack for the film, the composer tracked down all of  his master tapes & re-assembled everything for the record. There are details heard here that could easily be missed during the film.

I've also listened to the latest batch of Freak Animal tapes this week. All good stuff!

[Zeno Marx]

URE THRALL Discorporeality

This guy and label fascinate me.  He's in that gray area between DIY, adolescent, tens of projects, quasi-noisecore/punk approach and the Anamolous/ND arena of experimentalism.  So there is no confusion, nothing I've heard from him is noisecore or punk, but the multiple names and monikers like Smooth Quality Excrement, along with basic cassette presentation, cause me to associate certain aspects with prolific 90's DIY culture.  There's a good balance there.  Most of his work is really good quality, which should be of no surprise because of the company he kept (and continues to keep).  I believe Anomalous Records was his main distro hub for Discorporeality.  I'm sorry I didn't buy all those tapes from Anomalous (very probably in my top 5 music consumer regrets of the 90s).