A 2 day private event of experimental music…
12+13.09.2025 Reithalle Strasse E
Text, photos and videos: Mikko A
Except Moozzhead & GO photos: Mika Tuomikari
It is already tradition for me to visit TT each year. Only missing couple of the early ones I didn’t even hear about. Grunt played at TT sometime after organizer had seen the show in Broken Flag festival, and since then I have not missed single year of this festival that is happening in Dresden, Germany. I have discussed before at several occasions, what it really requires these days that people to travel for live shows?
In Finland we are sort of spoiled for having good noise shows happen pretty much monthly basis. For industrial events, there is less of activity. Week after this festival, there is BDN, Raison D’etre and more in Turku. They have been in Finland before, yet there are plenty of industrial artists unlikely to be seen over here.
Back in the day, when not much was happening in Finland, I used to go around Europe to check out shows. Mostly UK, thanks to dirt cheap Ryan Air tickets. Many times flying to UK was cheaper than taking train inside Finland! It wasn’t like flying somewhere was luxury. Just became cheap option sometime in 00’s. If I knew something was happening I wanted to see, it was considered. Nowadays there is way less of happenings where I feel I really need to go. Or perhaps even more it is about already having so much gigs over here that don’t feel like filling the last empty weekends that could be time dedicated for getting my own work done.
However, with TT festival, it is less about who exactly plays there, but the combination and the overall atmosphere. But, that said, this doesn’t mean I would not care who plays or that I am there just for the mood and to meet people. No way. I watch every artist, from start to finish. I just mean that I trust the curation, in ways that even if I would not see logic in inviting something, I know they have considered it. They have build diverse and somewhat unusual line-up that will not be all just catering expectations, but giving also new substance and surprises. So yes, in a way, I am most certainly there for the bands/artists.
As much as I could have wanted to see some of the artists who could not make it to the festival, I had no objections to replacement artists. There is something new, something old, something well know and guaranteed. Something that can be a gamble. This all feels ideal for the festival. This was also proven to work, since some of the very best things of this year, I didn’t expect at all and many told me the same.
Arrival to Dresden happened already on Wednesday. Flight was late. Annoying late. Meaning it looked like wouldn’t make it to the bus that had been booked from Berlin onwards. It didn’t look too exciting to postpone waiting the next bus that had space and pay vastly higher ticket prices so one would arrive to Dresden sometime late at night. Eventually it was decided to give a try to run across entire airport and see if one could make it. Running for almost 20 minutes worked out. Bus stop was reached 2 minutes before it was scheduled to leave. Not only it was some heavily sweaty exercise, but indeed making it to the bus to Dresden was quite relief compared to having to wait for hours at the airport.
I have been quite amused, what it is with Germans and they calendars. It is quite different from what we have over here. If you go to big bookstore in Germany, it seems like walls filled with calendars with all possible themes. From XXX stores, you will find X-rated calendars and I always regretted not buying one. So this time, when bus arrived to Dresden, about 20 meters from bus stop there is a branch of Orion. Nothing really out of ordinary is found in that German adult store chain, but it was opportunity to correct former mistakes: Purchased not one, but three different K18 calendars that will perhaps make my 2026 to be more organized! I would suppose it would be good to have giant image of penetration when are figuring out the plans for the future.
Following days mostly spent on investigating another german cultural highlight: Beer. Finding place that was not too cool and busy. No loud music. Not too many people. Favorite place did not even have functioning internet connection available. You could reach network only after going outside. This is pretty much unheard in Finland where phones work everywhere. Bar had open tap, so you just drink what you want, and at the end of night weirdly cheap final price you can handle with cash money. I like. Perhaps not a best idea to be in bar drinking till late night just before fest, but well… happens.
Had bought bunch of rough cartilage-sausages and octopus tentacles from supermarket. No salt, no spices, just keeping it caveman cooking level for breakfast at the airBB. Friday continued with meeting with bunch of international friends I get to meet very rarely. Coffee, beers, dinner and suddenly it seems like got to start rushing towards the venue to be there early enough. Being there roughly when doors open so no time is wasted on standing in the cue later on. Since 400 people were coming I knew it may get busy at the door at some point.
I tried to not go through merch tables too much, since having only small hand luggage to carry stuff. There would have been a lot of things to grab, though. Now it was basically two mandatory items I knew won’t be available elsewhere: Genocide Organ tape that came out for this festival and Kommando gig exclusive 2025 tape that may be available from other gigs they’re going to play. Those fit in easy, while vinyl would be out of question.
DAY 1 – VIDEO DOCUMENTATION HERE!
Minimum Sentence started the fest. For some reason, I was under impression this project was related to the Indonesian artist who played last year. I was watching the artists on stage and making assumption he ain’t Indonesian. Later turned out project is from London. There are a lot of bandcamp songs, yet physical releases are one tape on De/TAINMENT, one CDR and now debut full length CD on Tesco. Defined as ”industrial electronics” or ”gloom electronics”, both are pretty accurate. It was not power electronics, nor even full on heavy electronics, yet it would not make sense to call it dark ambient, drone and perhaps neither death industrial as the themes are quite varied? Something that has little bit of all those thing. Slow paced, ”doomy”, bleak and minimal sound. Vocals in the beginning and at the end of set were quietly spoken and otherwise man had his mouth shut with tape, focusing on creating instrumental soundscapes. Sometimes noises generated with bass, but mostly electronic sound.
Swedish duo Pågå was very good. It was slightly odd feature in fest, as LP that was published in Finland was like art-rock. Described to be something like Birthday Party meets Coil. Band instrumentation, firmly rock appearance. There was nothing rock related here. Pågå was doing experimental soundscapes, almost like sound collage. Both members were active in creating the sound that may have been non-stop flow, but clearly many different segments and themes appeared during quite long set. I don’t think there is releases that sound like this, unless the later tape release is something like this. Check out the video documentation to get idea what it is like, since visiting their bandcamp to hear the LP gives you completely different kind of material.
I wasn’t paying much attention what was project called Pffft…! I only remember that I was being told to not be turned off by their name and check it out. Project has been around for decades, but seemingly outside the circuit that revolves around recording albums and publishing them via record labels. This project was formed already back in 1984 and been existing in form of performances and improvised sets, with different members revolving around the founding member. This time it was two guys hammering totally traditional early days Test Dept -type metal percussion, mechanical loops, large bass drum percussion and on top of everything loud and commanding vocals through megaphones. It was possibly the biggest surprise of the festival. From no expectations at all, right away becoming one of the best sets of the fest. Short mechanical loops and classic limited ”rusty” sound of megaphones, combined with industrial music traditions a’la oil barrel percussion… I know someone will be asking what’s new? I would simply remind that the basic elements of old school industrial is something so rare it barely exists anymore! What’s new? If the ”new” is dorky apple logos shining from stage and nerds fingering buttons, I gladly take the old approach I haven’t heard for ages!
Being fan of early days Thorofon since they put out their now classic Maximum Punishment Solutions LP. I found out about pre-Thorofon project Kommando later on, since information around this project seems quite scarce? I own the early tapes, plus all noisier and heavy Thorofon releases. Their later, more musical approach didn’t appeal to me much. At some point I noticed that Kommando had returned and releases done by L.White and Ant-Zen. I even distributed some of the stuff, but it really took until latest LP when I was fully captured by the power of it. Kommando ”Wage of Wrath” LP came out on Ant-Zen in 2024 and I ordered handful for distribution and as soon as needle hit the groove, I was captured by the atmosphere of sort of traditional german heavy electronics. Intense processed vocals, heavy throbbing bass-synth rhythms and electric synth tones are all very traditional ingredients of this style, yet there are those who do it in uninspired way, those who can do the basics and come up with decent material, and those, like Kommando, who are masters in this style! LP was among the best things in this style in 2024. Not even sure if any heavy electronics release would have made same impact since? I had high expectation about the show. It was exactly that. Two people in odd, kind of dadaist masks, churning out good song after good song and only objection might be that it was so long set for such a linear material. Nevertheless, this was among highlights of the festival.
Nocturne is project I got familiar with his early releases like ”Offensive… De Paix”, ”Kommando Holocauste”, ”Kapitulation”, ”Hymn For Herest I & II”… but those all were happening already more than 20 years ago. Meanwhile many things happened. Most things I have heard from recordings, are right there up my alley. Sort of euro industrial, that is not exactly noise, not exactly extreme power electronics, not far away. Shifting from loud to dark, with historical / social / eerie themes. I always associated them to be somewhere around LJDLP, La Nomenklatur, Dagda Mor, Ex.Order and so on… but they are no longer that. I can’t really pinpoint the moment when exactly Nocturne became way more musical? That is what I have heard from his live shows. Big part of the shows are not what I liked about old Nocturne, but instead there is pretty easylistening electronic beats, female vocals, clearly more musical approach. Could it be the 2017 ”Hypnose Generale” album where they had tracks like ”Si tu passes” that may give you pretty accurate idea what many songs of the set sound like. After the show it felt like I should catch up with some of the older Nocturne material, but at the same time I was quite sure I do not need to dig deeper into the new style. In live situation, I appreciated some of the theatrical elements, where he was combining narration of lyrics, gestures of whipping with playing sounds of whip from sampler in a way that it made quite striking additions to song. I did like to watch the set live, but knew I would never listen this kind of song at home. The element of dark historical turmoil turned into sound seemed to have switched into somewhat naive socio-political statements.
I did not really know what to expect of Sigillum S. Celebrating 40 years of project, I thought they could be somehow revisiting their old approach, but then again, what would be better way of celebrating 40 years of existence than doing the new stuff you have been doing recently? I mean that if you really think what is better, some sort of bland attempt to recreate what you were doing as teenager or displaying that you are still active and creative, without being controlled by nostalgic sentimentality? Perhaps the latter one is the way to celebrate! Since 1985 Sigillum S has been exploring various sides of electronics and in this set, did mostly high speed rhythmic beat driven electronics. Perhaps opening track of recent 12” ”Aborted Towns, The Deadly Silence Before Utopia” gives you good idea what it was. I liked idea, I liked that they actually played live, with each three members constantly having input for sound, yet despite all that, I am not big fan of most of ”techno music”. That is where I will instantly lump this type of sound. Indeed, there was bunch of guys dancing through-out the set. It was loud, bass heavy, distorted and hard.
Soon after DJ’s started to blast ever-greens of industrial-noise. Starting with Con-Dom, soon GO, commanding NON tracks, etc. Having been awake since early in the morning, drinking beer and sweating like a pig at the hot venue, I didn’t have urge to go to the bar. Just take ride back to sleep. And to wake up like 7 in the morning and wondering what the fuck?! No hurry anywhere, but for some reason couldn’t get much more sleep even if it would have been needed.
Perhaps it was a sign that I need to start drinking beers I had bought day before. Couple of times at the Tower Transmissions it has been really task to drink all things I’ve bought. Finding yourself sunday morning, with bag of beers to destroy while waiting for bus to Berlin is not ideal situation. One of the most traumatizing experience was the year when Snuff played in TT. We had still big bags of beer bottles left, and knowing we can’t get those into plane, option was either leave them, give to someone, or drink on the way to Dresden airport. Someone mentioned we could perhaps hand over the beers to Brighter Death Now / Deutsch Nepal guys, since they are likely to be welcome any drinks… yet, anyone knowing what is the relationship with finns & swedes could see what is coming. There is no hostility or animosity at all, but it is god damn sure that no finn is going to hand over drinks to swedes with excuse being not able to drink more! So conclusion was that we’ll drink all beers in taxi, on the drive to airport. It failed miserably as trip was matter of minutes. In the end, bag of beers had to be thrown out to waste at the airport. All the parties felt it was better than surrender to Swedes, haha… Of course, no offense of BDN crew. In all honesty, I think they had no shortage of drink that weekend!
So, therefore now in the morning it felt I need to start combat with the problem of fridge full of german beer. After couple beers, there was arranged meeting with Mika of Noisecast, who was going to do report of festival in his podcast. He had plan to do couple interviews in English, but rest of the content in Finnish. Finns know this podcast well, but I would recommend people outside Finland to check out some of the episodes. There are some english language interviews that were done in-person with artists who played in Finland.
We did meet at park near by, and while I was drinking bottle of beer and one small wine bottle I had bought for whatever reason, we recorded discussion of what we had seen during friday. Indeed many times, the discussions with other people about what you experienced may be one thing how experience actually imprints into your brain. Far deeper and better than not thinking about it afterwards. After discussion was recorded, I had already meeting with bunch of friends around Europe and previous day routine of coffee, beer & dinner was repeated.
Earlier one friend was asking do I have app for local train rides. I mentioned I have so far never thought that in Germany you need to… you know… give a fuck? I mean, its country that declared everybody is welcome, so bums like myself can ride for free in all public transportation and no way I am wasting time to buy tickets or getting apps. With still three more beers in my pockets, I was too distracted and missed the nearest stop and had to walk back about one kilometer to the venue. No problem, since there was time. Not that I was drunk or anything. Tolerance levels are so high, that drinking beer is more like culinaristic act and lifting up mood than getting hammered. Needless to say, I don’t want to be hammered when I am about to see shows I want to experience in detail.
DAY 2 – VIDEO DOCUMENTATION HERE!
It started with Moozzhead. Finn noisemaker who started already back in the 90’s, but after releases that almost nobody knows of, and certainly almost nobody owns, he was quiet for many years. He made comeback about five years ago. All these years he had been one of the most devoted noise collectors in Finland and now when he was back in action, indeed he returned with all the skills and perfect vision how the best harsh noise is being made. Moozzhead is not a performer, he is more just noise maker. No show, no spastic movements, no theatrical elements, just man with his gear knowing how to make noise he wants to hear. Combined with video footage about things he appreciates the most. What we got, was juicy Moozzhead selection of vivid harsh electronics, with fat and wobbly qualities, in absolute precision in what makes him tick. In a way, Moozzhead is celebration of good things in life, including eroticism and energetic noise. Like I have said before, his style could be clearly associated with the 90’s Japanese noise, yet he doesn’t really sound like Japanese artists did back then. More like idea what you might have when thinking what Japanese noise was. Technologically advanced, rather high fidelity crispy production. Not edited too much and often somehow colorful noise electronics as opposed to crude crunchy roughness associated with biggest US noise of the time. 17 minutes of harsh noise blast was greeted with enthusiasm. This was by far the shortest set of the fest and the only full on harsh noise set.
It is not long ago since I was listening some old Trepaneringsritualen and was wondering what he has been up to during few years I may have missed something. Turned out I had missed nothing. It wasn’t about me not noticing releases, just Trepaneringsritualen not putting out new things! What we had here, was not really Trepaneringsritualen. Can’t write the runes here, but this is the ”side project” that collaborated with Nordvargr. This solo performance was described to be serene and static. Promo text explained that for the 27-minute duration of the ritual, the performer remains seated, seemingly motionless. Only the air moves. This meant exactly that. About 24 minutes were quiet and last couple minutes grew more intense and loud. He was doing nothing else but breathing though effects, over already pre-recorded soundtrack. It was good for what it was. Video nice. Sound nice. Aesthetic on the stage, nice. I just can’t help myself coming from a bit different angle, where it is one thing to sit through pre-created material compared to actually playing live. Does one have to play live, if it is not band, but… hmm.. presentation? There are different schools for the approach, but I remember already back in 90’s reading Macronympha interview from Bananafish, where they insisted noise really needs to happen in the spot so it captures the moment. Not being something that happened somewhere else and then it is merely documentation of something what was done before, but is not really happening in front of you. In ways that actual live creation of sound creation is. Of course what we saw, was a performance. Not even pretending to be a ”live music gig”. So I was sort of half and half. It was nice live performance, but then again, not ”a live music” where the magic is the spontaneous and unexpected qualities that come from unique tension of space, time and physicality interacting in ways that can transform sound into something that not even artist can full predict. Of course I have to admit, what TPR wants to evoke, is approached from different perspective.
Section C was born out of ashes of Sektion B that ended into not-so-stylish oneline drama between members. Changes are minimal. Pretty much just second vocalist responsible for yelling the slogans is no longer in the band. Two remaining members keep the legacy strong with new name, but identical approach. Big bold letters on banner stated GERMAN POWER ELECTRONICS and Sektion C delivered the vulgar and banal heavy assault in ways you can expect from them. Putting together the known elements of old Tesco & Steinklang roster. Fitting into lineage that can be traced to GO, Rasthof Dachau, Irikarah, Thorofon,… etc.. but if you thought some of those bands are too arty with their ambiguous approach, Sektion B is the blunt fist in the face! Giving machine gun style assault with the most common media topics of world today. We get wall size Trump face in the video screen, paper cut Trump figure standing on stage, songs that appear simplistic slogans revolving around things like fake news, refugees welcome, climate change, fuck off greta, holy land is on fire and so on. Indeed, every song received loud applause and cheering. Stage presence of mr. L.White yelling rough lyrics through flanger/phaser processing, hard hitting electronic signals and pulses and very well recognizable hit song structures. It made one think two things: How can someone do things that are this obvious, this blunt… but then again… Is there stuff like this?! One could come into conclusion that someone has to do it. While there is no stick long enough I would touch themes such as Greta Thundberg or Trump, I have seen recently people discuss that noise should not separate itself from surrounding world. Its been suggested that one should be able to take a stand or take part in, ehm… relevant social commentary? Of course I rather stand in position of question whether the common media brain cancer is the ”relevant social commentary” we need, or do we really need noise dudes reposting news and taking stand on current affairs, etc? Well, Indeed, it was good to see Sektion C. I have seen the trio form of band several times and now after many years they indeed stay loyal to the blunt in-your-face commentary they started already decades ago.
If I was slightly critical about TxRxP, I can elaborate it with Arktau Eos. With AE and the connected Aural Hypnox projects in general, I feel they are like embodiment of all things good in current day dark ritual music. Have been that for decades by now! Some people have suggested that I worship them merely because they are Finns, but nah, that is not the case! Of course I may have interest and perhaps even some bias towards favoring Finns, yet what Aural Hypnox is doing, clearly exists in such levels that there is no need to have some sort of nationalistic notion giving it extra points. Big part of Finnish music sucks ass anyways, so it really isn’t about whatever happens to emerge from here. Finnish noise, decent amount of Finnish (Black) Metal and perhaps even hardcore punk and such often contain some sort of unexplained quality that appeals to me. Aural Hypnox is sort of beyond the wold of man. Yet at the same time I am pretty sure the protagonists behind these projects indeed have the great appreciation for man made things. Meaning that their sound is most definitely like celebration of man made ritual music and visual art that man is channeling. We are not listening virtually generated sound or watching digitally generated art. There is no machine calculation, factory pre-set sounds, but most often everything on threshold where man is approaching the unknown. Very concrete, very tactile and physical means interacting with sounds that may elevate the consciousness and experience. It may sound somehow pompous to say it, especially if one is jaded cunt that no longer believes in absolute mind altering power of sound. But I do and I have zero time for projects that sort of cheaply emulate horror movie soundtracks with easiest possible means of machines that generate ”dark ambient” or perform ceremonies that have no meaning for them personally, but appear to be… cool? Sometimes you just know that this what you have in front of you, is something else. With AE, it happens in this moment, it is done in front of the audience, but I can be sure that the lifetime path of these guys in realms of dark sound is way more than simply sounding or looking cool. This radiates from the sound. Those qualities are so strong, that not even element of performance for the live audience really takes away anything. This was among the very best thing at the fest!
This is one of the qualities of industrial culture that I like the most. I am fully aware, that ”industrial” means different things for different people, but for me industrial culture, is most of all notion of returning to the questions that are supposedly solved and taken as granted. It could be as simple as returning back to idea of ritual music and strip it away from elements one thought ritual music ”should be”.
Perhaps simpler would be to observe re-evaluation something, where to see it differently that consensus dictates, something that is taboo. Literally meaning something forbidden being discussed, prohibited and restricted by social customs. If one dares, he is often met with strong negative response. Industrial culture was the one rare subculture that encouraged to take another look on it without pre-determined outcome. Perhaps take in use things in less common ways. Most of musical sub-cultures were rebellion against something, but very quickly became restricted by their own guidelines. Within industrial or noise, this only applies to cliques consisting very specific social community. The art-form and idea itself remains as possible one of the only true expressions of limitless thought? I know it sounds hyperbole, yet I would challenge anyone to display music style or music culture that has more to offer on this field!
As one example I could indeed raise theme of nationalism. What would be the music style where this idea is being discussed in ways it could deserve? It is good example, since next group on stage was going to be Genocide Organ! Of course we have some sort of nationalist tones existing other styles of music, but often it has completely different kind of foundation. It is also curious to wonder, could it be that most of the time we hear only perspective of formerly imperialist countries. It appears to be as if just about everybody associates nationalism with concept of supremacy and dominance, perhaps even imperialism, which should appear even diametrical opposition to how contemporary nationalism expresses itself nowadays? I often feel it may be the emotional remnants of imperialism that is the true anti-nationalist force these days. As easiest example, someone from USA insisting cultural power over other people from other nations with intent to establish cultural hegemony everybody should follow. As a person that comes from tiny nation that has struggled its entire existence, nationalism does not appear in form of something granted. It never was ”we are the best because…” and quickly leading to ”we should rule over the others”, but rather in form of ”we can do better” and ”we should be better”. If the generic breed of once great nations live in comforts of old achievements they take as granted, the new breed is far more in lines of faustian ethos, where there is combination of healthiest possible notion of we can do better, with the tragedy of European/western ethos. Human desire for greatness with potential downfall that can, or should we say will, accompany it.
In that sense, when I first heard Genocide Organ, it felt like this is it. This is the project that manages to cover many of the topics that are unheard in other music. Plus often unheard in bands of same ”genre”. They would touch the topics that were untouchable, but also dig deeper, beyond the obvious. Even if they would cover may of the classic hot topics, most often there was angle of doing something what was not blatantly obvious. It may be useless to dive too deep into outside perspectives about what GO is about. One may take a look at GO essays written by Noise Receptors Richard Stevenson in Fight Your Own War book.
If not talking about somehow healthy nationalist perspectives, but about obscene imperialist statement, what could be harder than track called “Kill Useless Nations”! Too bad this song from Save Our Slaves has never been performed live as far as I know? I remember when I first got the vinyl box set back in the 90’s. I gave 10 CD’s in a trade to a person to get this LP+7” set. At that time felt like quite expensive trade to do, yet never regretted it! Now of course one could throw 10 CD’s in trade for any old GO vinyl any time. When opening box and reading track list… ”Kill Useless Nations”, ”Death with Dignity”, ”John Birch Society”.. at the same time there is that ambiguity so you do not really know what GO is saying. But you also see that they do return to questions that have been formerly considered taboo in a way that it would be almost unheard that one would make song, discuss something, without standing in line with formerly agreed conclusion.
Furthermore, and perhaps more importantly, controversial topics are not used in ironic ways or somehow as laziest excuse of mirroring you the theme with intent that you should nevertheless be bound to come into same conclusions. This is what we generally see. Taboo subject presented in a way as if there would be literally one absolutely correct way of seeing it and as if it would be just somewhat routine riddle you will solve and come into same conclusion. Almost stubborn interest of Genocide Organ in phenomena where men take action. That is inspiring. Regardless of era of Genocide Organ, it may be the racial tension of old amerika, guerrilla action around the globe or military regimes of south america, military history in different parts of the world… yet when dealt by Genocide Organ, it seems to be most of all about: Men in action.
I talked with couple of guys, who felt that vocal feedback was unwanted and clearly a mistake. I felt pretty much opposite! This flanger feedback on vocals was great and the loud vocals were great. Songs, maybe not all were absolute GO hits, but good stuff. There was almost re-make of old classic thrown in. Enough changes that it barely was about replicating the old version. This was something more. It was loud and fierce and Wilhelm Herich was most of the time in the front, approaching the audience and advocating for chaos. It is not audible on the video material how loud and in your face it actually felt. On video vocals appear to take more space than is necessary, yet when you were actually there, it was far more balanced. This is one of the quality I often try to convince people. There is difference in thinking you could have been there vs actually being there. This is fact with live music and in life in general. I absolutely refuse all sort of apathy and refuse being jaded over things that directly inflicts ones life. One being making excuses where one doesn’t have to leave comforts of home, or be.. indeed man of action! Sure doing things costs some money, occasionally, but doing nothing costs ones life.
I was sort of surprised that Cintytalk would be headliner. Mostly because I never really heard people talk about. I only have one fairly recent collaboration LP and it never seemed to excite people who buy things from my store. I am sure it is just because band comes from different direction. History of this project goes back to early 80’s. Even further if you count in the former punk projects. This fits in line with Tower Transmissions having such names as Lydia Lunch, Attrition and more. One man was handling bass and effects, other laptop and possibly other electronics. Together they created very good soundscapes for Cintytalks chanting vocal performance. The best moments for me were when they took already great experimental textures into thunderous levels of noise. There was so good taste in dynamics and sounds that even in moments of noise, it wasn’t just blasting harsh sound, but playing noise with intent, very much composed and planned way, just loud and noisy. Low pitched and repetitive chanting often came from the hall, where Cindytalk would walk among the crowd. Either with microphone with very long cord, or later with wireless system. Audience was no longer as tightly packed as during Genocide Organ, so there was possibility to form little slice of open space for the artist. It was absolutely clear that these people were masterful in what they do, both in handling the instruments and performing for the audience. Plus, it was not ”music” in traditional sense. Experimental soundscapes, even if there was chords, tones and rhythms present. Very nice.
After the sets, I had some discussions with various people and eventually ended up to bar for one last little beer. It was almost 3 at night and bar was just about to close, so quickly gulping down Guinness and some white wine. Excellent decision when you are just about to go sleep. Group of 5 Finns was present there when doors were closing. Next day, lurking hangover after 4 days of beer consumption, bleak rain soaking everything wet when waiting for bus ride to leave at 11… Sleeping in the bus, sleeping on the plane and finally back in Lahti.
Worth the trip? Most definitely! Big thanks again for Eric, Ina and the whole Tower Transmissions crew making this possible.
Next thing happening in the same venue people could be interested is ANENZEPHALIA, GRUNT, HUMAN LARVAE gig. Anenzephalia playing exclusively new material. If you think you heard the old classic songs enough, its good to go and see the strength of current day Anenzephalia. Grunt, no fixed plans, but it is unlikely you will see many European gigs anytime soon, so if you want to see it, be in Dresden! Human Larvae has build itself pretty strong following already and you can expect good gig.
As usual, if wanting physical items, many of the artists mentioned in this report have something available from nhfastore.net
