Turku 9.-10.8.2024 HARSH WAYS FEST 2
FRIDAY
Text: Mikko A
Photos: Voragography
It has been over fifteen years since Anenzephalia played in Finland. 2008, Turku city, there was a show with Halthan and Zoät‐Aon. My recollections of the gig are vague, but I remember hearing first time ”Bodies Of Gold” track that was to appear on ”Kaltwelt” album. I was instantly impressed by the neat subtle but constant effect processing of the beat. This track was technically very advanced if associating a lot of Anenzephalia with cold, suffocating, almost lo-fi sounds. Since then, I have seen Anenzephalia play outside Finland few times and it has always been band I rated among ”will travel for this” -category.
These days you get to see a lot of artists in Finland. It means there is way less need to travel for noise. 20-30 years ago, to see something, you simply had to go abroad. I am not saying that there wouldn’t happen good shows now and exist good artists, but question is more like: Do I have urge to travel to other side of Europe or world to see artists? I still do it. Next will be Tower Transmissions next month! It may be once in a lifetime opportunity to see Mayuko Hino. Back in the day, there were things like ”Last show” of The New Blockaders, first shows of Sutcliffe Jugend, Consumer Electronics doing comeback. The return of power electronics Ramleh. Incapacitants coming to Europe. Hijokaidan in Europe with full line-up. Slogun in Europe and so on and on. As great as current day noise acts may be, many names do not appear as once in a lifetime type of scenarios, but something that could be happening many times, perhaps even in form of them visiting Finland.
I did travel to see Anenzephalia at the Tower Transmissions 2023 and as soon as I witnessed the power of new line-up, I confirmed Finn organizer that they should be brought to Finland and it will be worth it!
This time it wasn’t three band gig, but two day festival. First day was more focused on harsh noise artists. Atrophist started the fest and he was slightly bummed out about carrying limited amount of gear for this gig. Feeling as if it was not as good set as it could have been. I tend to describe his sets often as pretty loose attempts to find the sweet spot of harsh noise, hah.. So what you have is man with decent amount of gear, slowly building towards noise perfection, and when he reaches that, he usually fades things down and proceeds to other direction to look another thing. At his best sets, he keeps the intensity for longer moments and at worse sets he spends time on tweaking sound longer than the good moments last. Amek-Maj did short feat with him, seemingly not planned too carefully, just layer of additional amp noise at later part of set. Set was not bad, but considering what was about to come, not among the memorable sets of this fest and I would say his set couple days earlier in Helsinki was stronger.
Next band was supposed to be YANA, but since one of the members was ill, it was replaced in last minute with solo act of the other member. One of the current heroes of Finn harsh noise, Amek-Maj didn’t do his best set, but decent harsh noise. Most of it felt like he is warming up, kind of holding back intentionally, until he is ready to burst into full energy. That was what basically happened. At one point he sparked, exploded with full energy and during this short climax of the set I was like ”aaah! This is Amek-Maj!!”, but it was over very quickly. Good, nevertheless!
To display difference of good and great set, it was Moozzhead who set the standard. Perhaps the two former artists did exactly what is needed: warmed up the atmosphere. When Moozzhead started to deliver his trademark electronic pedal heavy harsh noise, it really electrified entire audience. Intense tweaking of pedal buttons and shaking his little noisebox with contact mic, to deliver vivid and colorful noise that blasted with consistent heavy loudness, yet full of rich detail. No warm up, no restraints, just non-stop highlight moment extended for duration of entire set!
AntiChildLeague did pretty much the same set as in Helsinki couple days before. Helsinki felt more intense, due loudness of vocals. In Turku, her contact mic’ed items worked better and volume was way way louder than in Helsinki. Video projection was larger size, yet perhaps not same amount of intensity in performance? It may have been merely illusion in Helsinki, since in darkness, there was almost claustrophobic feel. The impressions you had, was less about seeing and more what was imagined. In Turku, ACL did storm into crowd, get people scream on her microphone, actively carve and smash noise sounds over loud and solid backing tape. Perhaps if vocals were louder, it would have been among best ACL sets I have seen. Now, at least noisiest!
JSH, on the other hand, had zero technical issues. Well, if you count out that guitar amps on stage was turned on only about half way to the set, but that wasn’t really flaw. It was already so loud, that you were not missing anything and it just added little extra punch for rest of set. A truly world-class live action, where the man was shaking and raging, resembling sort of hardcore live show atmosphere. It was not just for a show but body movements were directly connected with the making of noise. It was never blurry HWN, but sharp, precise expression with clarity of detail. Even if that detail was pure distorted Harsh Noise! It wasn’t just rumbling and loudness, but noise where all the timbre and pacing has… intent. I guess that’s the difference between searching and improvising and simply executing with total control of noise.
It’s was a bit worrying how Impakt could even pull harsh noise set after this. But actually, no worries! Two Finnish gentlemen with a smile on their faces, blasted about 25 minutes of unrelenting harsh fireworks. Large metallic cucumber jar filled with Stinkfinger’s scrap metal was thoroughly trashed while Umpio was responsible for mixer-feedback-loop processing of the mentioned sound and perhaps little other sources. Both guys had this wink-wink noise fun times feel to live action. PA is pretty much ideal for noise like this. There is enough volume and the type of sound they make is so good. I often complain about usual club gigs and bigger venues, since there tends to be too much emphasis on subwoofer rumbling. It is so annoying when sound should be loud and ripping, and what you actually get, is this soothing lame sub-bass rumbling and none of the true punch you NEED for noise! At the HWF all bands had pretty much ideal sound for my taste! I am pretty sure audience agreed, since these sets started to create pretty hectic ”pit” in front of stage. People getting wilder and wilder and cheering loud when it all ended.
SATURDAY
The morning was spent walking around Turku city. From second hand bookstore Alfa Antikva found a couple of old Finn comic zines from the late 60’s and earluy 80’s. I am still very inspired by these somewhat crappy underground comics, that display the spirit of self made, almost revolutionary moment when artform known as ”comics” transformed from kids entertainment into self published counterculture. Turku Comic Shop is always place to visit. It is one of the last remaining in entire country! City like Lahti, doesn’t have even actual bookstore. Last second hand bookstore has closed. The national chain that sells new mainstream books is more focused on selling scented candles and toys than actual literature. Therefore it is a delight to go into places like Sammakon Kirjakauppa, where you can still find small press books, poetry, art, and so on. City is small enough, so spontaneously meeting people from EST label, Pseudokommando, Bizarre Uproar, Sick Seed, Marzipan Hooligan, Unclean, Kommando Skin-graft and so on to go into local brewery / burger place to hang out and discuss the history of Finnish noise gigs and vague recollections of things that happened over last 30 years.
Journey towards the venue turned out quite adventurous. In middle of traffic lights suddenly car makes loud noise and doesn’t move after that. Nothing else to do but call a tow truck. It seemed as if the gearbox was fucked. It’s a bit annoying to happen, especially on the other side of Finland. Situation wasn’t meant to be for worrying, so as fast as possible, getting the car towed to the venue and congratulating myself that now I can also drink beer, since I can’t drive! Following week turned out it was actually drive shaft that broke. Luckily not bankruptcy level thing in the end, but towing car though half Finland was the pricey part.
If Friday was a harsh night, there was enough of that for Saturday as well. The main focus was on darker electronics and bleaker gray tones.
The Truth Commission was strange new project I knew, but haven’t heard or seen before. Sound check had been long and exhausting, so it was funny to see two men in suits, with horse masks, appear on stage and perform very elegant and fairly minimal set. Tape playback, theremin, junk-shakebox, live mix and performance of the horse face masked men cannibalizing horse-meat associated sausage slices, haha. At the same time disturbing, weird, yet also funny. This may be one of the elements from older industrial/noise that is rarely seen these days. Surely you can see pig mask Sick Seed appear at some of Bizarre Uproar gigs, yet performance that borders weird fun is something you could expect at Smell & Quim or Crank Sturgeon shows, but very few of new guys want to go beyond t-shirt and jeans -type of outfit? Therefore, this set clearly went into positive side as it didn’t appear pure joke or slapstick comedy, but just… weird.
Stinkfinger had pretty much done big parts of his tricks in previous nights Impakt set. His solo set was therefore focusing on something a bit different. Mostly razor sharp high pitched harsh noise. No bass crunch, no ultra fast urgent technical modulations. Just back to basics harsh noise. Works.
The Day of The Antler suffered a bit from video projector shutting itself down spontaneously and it was located in place where it would have been annoying to spend too much time fixing it in middle of set being played. Man would casually stand in front of table consisting antlers, tape players and small amount of other gear that was being used for processing source material. His sound at both recent gigs and latest tape was vastly noisier than older material that occasionally almost kosmische kraut synth type of approach mixed with more ”industrial” atmosphere. Good set, bleak and fairly minimal. Just doing his thing.
Pain Appendix is again moment when I have to repeat my mantra about the superiority of the space and sound. If you compare this to the Pain Appendix shows last year, which were good, you still have to admit this was so much better! Both live experience based on the sound and but also atmosphere of the milieu! Camo-nets on the wall, big screen of visuals, stage looking good.. PA blasting with good volume and clarity. When the artist was about to start the show, I went to talk with him and asked if he was really going to play on the floor level in front of the stage… He was sure that he would do this, but after a while he thought about it again and asked what I thought about it. Of course, playing surrounded by the audience has its own advantages. Intimacy of being inside circle of spectators… But when there are almost a hundred people watching, I feel a little awkward situation if dozen people can see you play and the others, especially those on the back of room, have no chance. Perhaps also selfish reason, as I wanted to see Pain Appendix! Table was lifted on the stage and set started and god damn! It ruled. Not only the sound, composition and creation of entire set was top notch, also the audience got fest’s most active skin contact during the set when artist jumped into crowd.
Pain Nail set consisted alternative live versions of two songs known from ”Veren Seisauttava Oppi” 2×10” and three more songs that are yet to be published anywhere. All were performed first time at this gig. New video projection. Sound is slightly more crude and lo-fi in new materials. Intentionally. Also avoiding the popular things colored the set. Not hammering junk metal, picking up violin screeches as opposed to just synth tones and so on. It is very much “pure Pain Nail”, but intentionally shifting forward. A bit less than 25 minutes set!
Anenzephalia, of course, such old favorites that it is bound to be viewed through fan lenses. Although the new stuff is a bit different from old classics, we have seen this coming. Like mentioned ”Bodies Of Gold”, and Kaltwelt stuff in general had a lot of synth-driven technically advanced stuff. Or material after that with more emphasis on synth. What they create, is totally unique. In Finland, you rarely see this kind of euro heavy electronics old school way of doing gigs. It is very rare occasion to get set of 45 minutes with charismatic frontman / woman delivering bleak lyrics over static brooding, dark, heavy and gloomy sound. It is like diametrical opposition for 10 minute noise blast fireworks. It worked well for me and watching the audience and talking with people afterwards, it seemed to be the common opinion. Some went as far as declaring it to be the best live gig of genre. Hard to say, but excellent! Anenzephalia has a way to deal with some of the very classic industrial themes and even include almost too obvious topics in their songs. Like considering would video footage of pandemic demonstrations be… interesting? One can obviously ask, in what ways they should be interesting. It was some pretty damn bleak footage there. Lyrics remain ambiguous and delivered in almost emotionless, robotic style. No shouting. No yelling. Just slowly repeated lines with that one-of-a-kind Anenzephalia sound. Duo taking turns on vocals. Set was build into one solid piece, where tracks would usually change with cross-fade between them. Samplers, effects, backing tracks, video art projected on the wall.
Harsh Ways Fest 2 was success. Mostly Finns, but also people from bunch of European countries was present. Everything was running on schedule, none of the sets failed and perhaps even more it was people doing some of their best sets so far. Harsh Ways Syndicate is planning for more great live events, so I urge to follow them in social media or at Special Interests forum posts.
Also worth to notice, last copies of Harsh Ways Fest 1 double CD + zine release is available! Studio quality recordings and exclusive material. Also Vihaa Ja Kiimaa Ikuisesti 3xCD box +zine set was published at the HWF2. It includes Bizarre Uproar, Sadio, Umpio and more! Complete sets from everybody! Easiest international orders can be made to Freak Animal’s nhfastore.net