As one of the early pioneers in the industrial and noise fields, Bianchi never quite attained the same status as Whitehouse, Throbbing Gristle, or SPK. This might be because of his relatively short career: beginning as Sacher-Pelz in 1979 and continuing on under his own name until 1984, his time on the scene was brief, but prolific. This reissue of one of his classic albums is augmented both with bonus tracks and a second disc of obscure/bootlegged tracks that showcase one of the bleakest, most desolate musicians of his time.
Give us an hour, we'll give you music to remember. This week we bring you an episode with brand new music from Softcult, Jim Rafferty, karen vogt, Ex-Easter Island Head, Jon Collin, James Devane, Garth Erasmus, Gary Wilson, and K. Freund, plus some music from the archives from Goldblum, Rachel Goswell, Roy Montgomery. Rubber ducks and a live duck photo from Matthew in the UK. Get involved: subscribe, review, rate, share with your friends, send images!
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In recent years, Greg Anderson and Stephen O'Malley have pushed the live sound of Sunn O))) away from the typical riffs, robes, and dry ice formula. This release documents one of two site-specific performances given in Europe since 2006; here their hyper-amplified doom is played out within the confines of Bergen's Domkirken cathedral and utilizes the church's organ as well as its massive acoustics (the other performance being the Moog Ceremony concert in Brussels). Joined by some Sunn O))) regulars (as well as Lasse Marhaug), this is one of the better live albums by a group whose discography is peppered with savage live recordings.
With their new album, Digital Darkness, Somatic Responses lay down the raw anger and metallic, broken, saw-edged decay of seized-up industrial breakdown. Their use of jagged, spastic beats, quickfire stabs of rusty chainsaw buzz, and acid-oil-tinged spikiness recalls the social price that was paid when the coal-mining industry in the South Wales valleys was devastated in the last century.
Following the release of their (so far) only album Chaos Is My Name a couple of years ago, this trio consisting of Khanate’s James Plotkin and Tim Wyskida and Thorr’s Hammer’s Runhild Gammelsæter played exactly one gig and seemed to have left it at that. Luckily the show was recorded on a couple of cameras and has made its way onto this DVD. As great as the album was, the video presented here shows that the studio fails to capture the full intensity of the group’s performance.
There are the usual features that Masami Akita employs in his work: mastering at a face-melting volume, piercing high pitched noises, sand-blasting roars of sound, and, particularly in recent years, the obligatory Save the *insert animal here* artwork. On this last point Akita is normally very heavy handed and just slaps a picture of the animal on the cover or some less than subtle point about vivisection (but then is there anything subtle about a man who has spent his life trying to deafen the world) but on Dolphin Sonar he has made a far more concerted effort at a protest album. All of the sound here can be described as manmade violence or Akita's representation of marine life as envisaged by the dolphin; his anger is directed at where the two ideas meet.
There has been no shortage of metal-tinged instrumental bands these last few years but few can pull it off like Boston's heaviest band. The Touch Records style cover can be quite deceptive: what lurks inside is equal part rock monster and rock ogre; it starts with a bang and finishes with a louder bang.
With Mathew Sweet's third release for Kranky, he secures himself as the arch-mage of death soaked acoustica. Again employing mostly his guitar and breathy vocal, while momentarily reaching for further instrumentation, this album is less hidden-away sounding than previous Boduf Songs recordings. It is, however, still imbued with inimitable sense of intimateness, darkness, and magic.
Eschewing any species of frills or frippery, the simple card and paper-fastener packaging encasing this latest entry from Machinefabriek in Staalplaat's Mort Aux Vaches series resolutely reflects the aesthetic of Dutch musician Rutger Zuydervelt. Although sparse is the operative word here, Zuydervelt's lean compositions and quiet tiny sounds, carefully sculpted around deep spaces, are nevertheless harmonically and richly complex, ranging from fragile gossamer tones to deeply sweeping friezes. Moreover, the music is warmly inviting and enticing, indeed inviting and enticing one to explore a strange and slightly surreal world.
Apparently they do make them like this anymore. A mere 38 years after it was begun; Fotheringay's second album is released. Another chance to hear the voice of Sandy Denny, famously described as like 'a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes.'
It’s refreshing to hear an album of sonic abstraction that falls into neither of the following categories: minimalist drone, harsh noise, or crossover into other electronic realms. Not that there is anything wrong with those at all, I enjoy many works that fall into those aforementioned categories. But works like this collaboration between the Illusion of Safety member and long time sound artist and master for hire Dimuzio are fascinating in that they are focused only on the nuanced textures of sound.
