PLAYLIST with COMMENTS/REVIEWS

Started by GEWALTMONOPOL, December 15, 2009, 09:30:59 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

FreakAnimalFinland

DOGLIVEROIL "Present Six Physiognomies" tape
Labyrinth recordings
1996. Labyrinth Recordings is not probably label many worship, but it has special aura to it nevertheless. Putting out  Slogun ‎– The Pleasures Of Death original tape, various Italian projects including Murder Corporation, Discordance, Dead Body Love,... and such. Dogliveroil probably doesn't have same cult reputation or devoted following as mentioned bands, haha, but this UK noise group managed to create some tasty stuff. This tape being one example. It is pretty free flowing group noise, where everybody just makes some sort of noisy sound and it results something which ain't stylish harsh noise nor edited & cleaned up, nor distorted to ultimate grain. It is noise filled with frenzy and chaos, few misses, many great moments.

Big Road Breaker "A Sum Of Destructions" tape
Muzamuza Records ‎– MUZA 01
Had zero recollections what this could be. I liked what I hear. 1995, pro-tape in nice cardboard box covers. Hand numbered 500! No wonder it is available at discogs starting from 2 euros! That price is a joke compared to how good tape actually is. Sound collage meets fairly musical industrial/electronic music. Hard to really analyze it. When looked discogs for more info of project I see this compared to Hafler Trio and Throbbing Gristle but closer to RRRECORDS' shortwave-and-found-sound noise works. Not bad references. If one can still grab this for 5 euro or less, I'd go for it if I wouldn't already have it.

SEWER ELECTION "Killing for Denmark" tape
Harsh noise wall. That's about it. Thick and good, though.

WARFARE NOISE "Black noise command" tape
when you get something like this, expectations are not highest. This time, actually surprises being one of the best demo tapes from Finland. Cover describes this Black noise grind metal. As band name suggest, there is strong Cogumelo Records influence. Also Blasphemy and Havohej could be traced. But then also.. Blood? Agathocles? That type of brutal and rugged grindcore feel. Sound being excellent. Filthy and raw, but not "all at maximum - we don't care" type of sound, but actually have some own character here.  Something you could have expected to be recorded in late 80's or early 90's, but rarely succeeded these days.

E-mail: fanimal +a+ cfprod,com
MAGAZINE: http://www.special-interests.net
LABEL / DISTRIBUTION: FREAK ANIMAL http://www.nhfastore.net

cr

To honor the 40th anniversary of the death of one of my teenage heroes:
SID VICIOUS: Sid sings LP

Haha, fuck yess!

Duncan

Quote from: FreakAnimalFinland on February 02, 2019, 03:54:59 PM
Big Road Breaker "A Sum Of Destructions" tape
Muzamuza Records ‎– MUZA 01
Had zero recollections what this could be. I liked what I hear. 1995, pro-tape in nice cardboard box covers. Hand numbered 500! No wonder it is available at discogs starting from 2 euros! That price is a joke compared to how good tape actually is. Sound collage meets fairly musical industrial/electronic music. Hard to really analyze it. When looked discogs for more info of project I see this compared to Hafler Trio and Throbbing Gristle but closer to RRRECORDS' shortwave-and-found-sound noise works. Not bad references. If one can still grab this for 5 euro or less, I'd go for it if I wouldn't already have it.

Still active today as brb>voicecoil despite many sporadic spells of inactivity. Collabs with Culver are especially good. Great live act too.


FallOfNature

Gilles De Rais Order / Mania - split 7''
Great track from Gilles De Rais Order. Strong vocals and nasty feedback. Real shame there isn't more material like this from the project. Mania track is quite brooding, vocals in the distance, feedback, lots of low end to contrast. Great EP all 'round, my only gripe it that it's too short.

Asides from that I've been checking out some recent Death Metal. Those I've managed to like enough to listen to multiple times are purchase are
Musmahhu - Reign Of The Odious
Mortal Wound - Forms Of Unreasoning Fear
Cerebral Rot - Cessation Of Life
Mortuous - Through Wilderness
Sulphurous - Dolorous Death Knell


Lazrs3

Quote from: Duncan on February 02, 2019, 07:19:20 PM
Quote from: FreakAnimalFinland on February 02, 2019, 03:54:59 PM
Big Road Breaker "A Sum Of Destructions" tape
Muzamuza Records ‎– MUZA 01
Had zero recollections what this could be. I liked what I hear. 1995, pro-tape in nice cardboard box covers. Hand numbered 500! No wonder it is available at discogs starting from 2 euros! That price is a joke compared to how good tape actually is. Sound collage meets fairly musical industrial/electronic music. Hard to really analyze it. When looked discogs for more info of project I see this compared to Hafler Trio and Throbbing Gristle but closer to RRRECORDS' shortwave-and-found-sound noise works. Not bad references. If one can still grab this for 5 euro or less, I'd go for it if I wouldn't already have it.

Still active today as brb>voicecoil despite many sporadic spells of inactivity. Collabs with Culver are especially good. Great live act too.



BRB and Culver Playing live soon too, look forwards to seeing them. Don't know anything about either, should be fun.

Merzbow / Opening Performance Orchestra - MERZOPO. Split album, the Merzbow stuff gets better as it progresses,  more into the Opening Performace stuff though, excellent build up and controlled assault.

DSOL

lately

Strict - Kiss
Immolation - Here In After
Merzbow - Protean World
Forteresse - Thèmes Pour La Rébellion
"I do not get bored of nude ladies nor good Japanese noise"

Peterson

Causings "4-Hour Body" CS (self-released, 2019?)
        Nice little tape of subtle, understated experimental/musique concrete sent to me by a member of the group, one Derek Baron – some folks 'round here may know him from his Reading Group label. Not exactly sure how to describe this kinda stuff. Basic components are field/incidental recordings, various acoustic clank and clatter, and some electric guitar through what I assume is a tiny box amp. Normally I wouldn't find this combination all that interesting, considering how haphazard these things tend to be, but this is pretty enjoyable and actually builds good atmosphere and tension after a minute or so. I guess this stuff sort of sounds like outtakes from the first two This Heat albums. Snippets from radio and television interject occasionally, along with what sounds like accidentally pushing the record button on Baron's tape player(s). The acoustic clatter is hard to pin down but also pretty small, "domestic" and tinny at times, which is the only real complaint. Meanders here and there, also, but that seems intentional, if that's possible. Guitar sort of struggles to reach the point of rhythm/melody and otherwise just drones quietly for tone and texture. Creates a very inviting sense of space. Fans of Graham Lambkin-related anything would do well to contact Derek and pick this one up.

Bicipital Fine s/t CD (Off, 2017)
        I doubt I would have checked this out without Derek having sent this to me, but I'm glad he did. This is a sort of restrained take on free jazz/avantgarde jazz that gets noisy but never loud and is quite odd but never skronky and abrasive. Normally that'd be a huge detracting point, but this really works for me. Very pleasant flute and trumpet along percolating full bass and of course Derek Baron's weird, quiet tape (electro-)acoustics. I've always wanted to hear something vaguely like this (e.g. quiet free jazz) and this isn't like what I'd imagined, but still fits the bill and a very relaxing listen – morning coffee music/Sunday afternoon-type stuff.

Lt. Col. Cooter "Substandard Operating Procedure" CS (self-released, 2018)
Lt. Col. Cooter "Covert Operations ..." CS (self-released 2018)

        New offerings from a project that is beginning to really explore all possibilities; sound work vs. performance art, comedy vs. commentary, and so on. Here, we get some contrast from the Besmirched 2: Uncut tape in the exploration of interrogation techniques and the darker side of U.S. diplomacy. The real highlight of the two is the A-side of "Covert" which consists only of the man himself being waterboarded and a gradually-encroaching high-end synth tone.  Otherwise, there's some nice (and funny) noisy sound collage (featuring Rosie O'Donnell) but the strong point here is the introduction of new angles/approaches – how many people do you know who've voluntarily waterboarded themselves for the sake of a performance or recording? Furthermore, thank fuck some research went into these concepts, rather than just lazily "presenting" current events or whatever. Good stuff that perhaps offers more promise for what's ahead than necessarily a home-run, but I don't really see too many others simultaneously offering humor and insight, so a cut above by that token alone.

Psycho Ex-Girlfriend CS (Bacteria Field, 2018)
        On side A, the mother of all thrift store tape scores – ad nauseam recordings from an answering machine of someone's, well, psychotic ex calling. Repeatedly. With increasing psychosis. One of the better quotes is something like "I'd like for you to just do something really impulsive and risky, you know, to show me that you care." Not really good for foul moods, but on better days, impossible to avoid laughing aloud. On the B-side, you get garden variety harsh noise with the previous answering machine recordings buried underneath. Sorry Eddie, sorry Jake, there's just no way the B-side can live up to what the A-side offers. Should've just included more of these recordings if any. Good stuff no less but just can't measure up.

Paul Bowles "Baptism of Solitude" promo CS (Meta, 1995)
        Disregard this review if you aren't already a fan of the author. Here, we get readings of excerpted Bowles prose, poems, and such against some ambient synthesizer played by Bowles and Bill Laswell. In some moments, it works (esp. "Next to Nothing," "You are not I," and "A Distant Episode,") but otherwise I would've been just as happy with nothing but Bowles' voice – no eerie/cheesy synth presets can match the beauty and darkness of his words, anyhow, and really the man just had an excellent speaking voice. Advertisement on cover describes it as "haunting" which is pretty spot-on – the best part in Bertollucci's film version of The Sheltering Sky is when Kit runs into the cafe in the final scene to find Bowles himself: "Are you lost?" Something about the man's voice is just exactly how a writer and personality such as himself should sound. Sui generis. Mystical in a way, yet totally lacking any coherent sense of dumb "spiritual" notions whatsoever. Maybe someone with advanced audio software can isolate the readings for me and then I can have the recording how it really should be.

Violent Shogun "Taste Our Japanese Steel" CS (Yes Divulgation, 2018)
        Damn! Really atmospheric and enjoyable junk metal abuse that manages to be somehow both blown-out and varied in texture, as well as quiet. This has to be heavily treated on tape because although it seems to have originated with really well-recorded sources/acoustics, it's saturated and decayed enough to sound like old M.B./M.O., or a more aggro version of Alleypisser. Or, at times even like an earlier Hal Hutchinson tape dubbed to older and older tapes over and over again for maximum gain, decay and saturation, then treated to amazing stereo EQ.
        Side A goes from rotten scraping and creaking with background high-end to continuous but dynamic and fluid texture wall, which lets up to reveal some amazing clunk and clatter with gorgeous (I mean fucking gorgeous, man) acoustic character – possibly with some leftover tape shit bleeding in underneath, or maybe, I don't know, the sound of one of the tape recorders itself. Cutting through that after a long, relaxing passage is a series of rapid cuts of noise bursts that I have a hard time believing is only just junk metal (there's obviously some feedback). This gives way to rusty clanging that is not so much harsh but hard before the tape runs out.
        Side B was clearly not material from the same project, but hard to tell if it was included intentionally or not. Some kind of cavernous and tape-saturated death metal that could be, I don't know, Incantation, Slugathor, Asphyx or one of those bands. Not bad at all. Nice drum sound, good riffing, old-school vocal style. I wonder what others who received this tape got?
        Perhaps I'm a little biased, but pretty much anything from this project is going to be well-thought-out, well-executed, and impressive in terms of technique/style, even in basic/simple mode as with this tape. Sounds utterly dismal on a cold day in my drafty apartment. For fans of: early Hal Hutchinson, Massimo Toniutti, Altar of Flies, Sewer Election.

Sewer Election "Dismal" (Team Boro Tapes, 2018)
        Top-notch harsh work from a project that's pretty much always doing whatever is being attempted really well. Side A has crunchy noise with a propulsive, sputtering forward-momentum with the signature SE tape decay/saturation. Description said "barely-there feedback" but it sounds pretty fuckin' loud to me (precise but blown-out trilling tones). A few minutes in things get more broken-up with interruptions of mid-range screech – you pretty much get tonal/timbral variations on that formula. Awesome. Side B begins with some of the most stunning basic-yet-detailed tape saturation crackle I have ever heard. Almost as if you took a Vast Glory tape and repeatedly copied it from older tape to even older tape. Whining alarm high-end and sharp feedback cut in after a few minutes. B is more shift-heavy with lot of stop-start action but more or less retains a limited color pallette like A. If you like the project in question, Wince, or Legless, you probably already have this. You know the drill.

MyrtleLake

Quote from: Force Neurotic on February 08, 2019, 08:31:01 PM
Violent Shogun "Taste Our Japanese Steel" CS (Yes Divulgation, 2018)
        Side B was clearly not material from the same project, but hard to tell if it was included intentionally or not. Some kind of cavernous and tape-saturated death metal that could be, I don't know, Incantation, Slugathor, Asphyx or one of those bands. Not bad at all. Nice drum sound, good riffing, old-school vocal style. I wonder what others who received this tape got?

It is an incredible listen, Taste Our Japanese Steel. I believe all physical cassettes are recycled (1) and dubbed with whatever random fancy he found, acquired or whatnot on the B-sides. (2) All different.

My copy:
(1) Cassette professionally printed for a children's christian bible study reading.
(2) 100 short jingles—as for a commercial or something. 100 wide variations of musical, short diddies possible to purchase for your commercial use. Between each one is a man's voice identifying a number for each selection.

Euro Trash Bazooka

Damn, thank you both for the really kind words and support.

B-sides are dubbed with whatever I find cool or listen to at the moment. Tapes are all recycled and old. And all the sounds on that tape come from the same little tiny box with springs and a contact mic on it that I treated through my tape 4-tracker. No effects were used on the tape. The simplest the best.
DROIT DIVIN: https://droitdivin1.bandcamp.com/

CRYPTOFASCISME / VIOLENT SHOGUN /
ETC: https://yesdivulgation.bandcamp.com/

FreakAnimalFinland

MOOZZHEAD "Hurl Carousel" tape
ltd 20 copies Finnish noise tape from 1996. One side microphone and vocals. Other bass and efx. Nothing phenomenal, but occasionally B-side gets into decent levels. Sort of early experiments of project that didn't develop further - at least not yet!

STIMBOX / NKONDI "whatflavorisnoise?" tape
Dull Full Rivets productions
C-90. Stimbox is strong harsh noise here. Nkondi can't match the level, but is not bad either. I wonder if anyone is in touch with mr. Stimbox?

SIGILLUM S "Studs and divinity" tape
Minus Habens tapes
Album opens with great noisy piece, but starts to go to their gothy' keyboard industrial type of material. Not bad, but not their best. Still decent listening when technology is quite old.

BRUME "Katherine" tape
Old Europa Cafe
Early 90's works, really nice. Brume is something I have quite a lot, but can't really say I could even name my favorite release. Like with Sigillum S, it tends to be the older, the better what dictates how works fit to my taste.

Achim Wollscheid "Der Gefaßte Raum" tape
1995 self published tape I have bought many years ago from artware productions. I doubt I ever listened this despite been in shelves for decades... What we have here is text reading by various guys, mixed with the sound of japanese noise artists. Subtitle of tape is "über die Japanische Noise Culture". For guy who doesn't understand language, it's almost like poetry mixed with noise, yet never captures the earcandy levels of sheer noise. One could say it is actually most of all....  irritating.

FACTOR X "a;m" tape
Personal Soundtracks
Another long ago Artware productions scores. One hour of odd sound collages of noises, voices, spoken bits, music fragments. I believe he did edit this tape out of tape cuts. It gives neat sound what "computer" or "sampler" collages do not necessarily have.

V/A WILL POWER REPORT #2
Public Demand Cassettes
The Brutumn Fulmen - quite flat electronics. Perhaps early computer noise experiments? BAD KHARMA track being Marhaug re-make, is heavy harsh noise. Burt Reynolds Ensamble is horrid howling free music. CRY HAVOC last one the comp is one the more obscure Japanese noise projects.

OVMN "II" tape
MSNP tape
MACRONYMPHA "Crack" tape
MACRONYMPHA "Metal noise" tape

Mother Savege
OVMN offers brutal hwn. Tape titled simply MSNP is compilation with One Dark Eye, Macronympha, Slave Labour, MxM and OVMN. Cover offers no details what, when and so on... Good stuff nevertheless.
Two Macro tapes 1995 crack and 1993 metal noise - both solid and good releases. No complaints other than the "uniform design", same font always etc.

FACIALMESS / HERMIT split tape
Recalcitrant Noise
Fuck how great Facialmess is on this tape! Listening some of his later works where cut up & funny bits never get really brutal has made me wonder what were the actually best Facialmess recordings out there. And I can vote for this. Almost flawless performance of fast, brutal, ripping and highly vivid movement. Never gets boring during 30 mins of duration. Hermit is also good here, but his work is so much more toned down industrial type noise that after being electrocuted by Facialmess, it doesn't feel equally exciting. Probably projects would have both benefited from solo C-30 releases?!

INHALANT "Clinical" tape
Propulsive Audio
60 copies of this tape came wrapped in surgical mask. Sound is very fitting to packaging. Clinical is quite good word. It's distorted and it is noisy, but also clinical in a way that synths sound sharp and shiny, not rusty and blunt. Sound is bright and in your face, not distant cavernous lo-fi gutter noise.
E-mail: fanimal +a+ cfprod,com
MAGAZINE: http://www.special-interests.net
LABEL / DISTRIBUTION: FREAK ANIMAL http://www.nhfastore.net

Lazrs3

#7180
Don Manderin - Mother of all the distortions Cassette - self released - Very Isoteric warped field recordings on one side, strange drones on the other. This project seems to be controlled by a Facebook profile of the same name, some youtube Videos pop upand tapes are sold through eBay. A bit of a mystery project, fairly prolific, but just very odd. I like the sense of mystery tbh.

Broken Flag - A Retrospective 1982 - 85. Vinyl on Demand CD Box Set 2012. Finally got a copy of this, I've been listening to it all week. I have some box sets by some of the artists on here that expand upon the work ( Ramleh and Maurizio Bianchini), but it's great to finally own this and listen to all the older pioneering work by the different artists that were on the label.

cr

Yesterday and today I was in perfect mood for listening to some Lithuanian projects - Pogrom, of course, a longtime favourite of mine. Svaixt, Oorchach, oro!oro!, Daina Dieva/Skeldos, Girnu Giesmes, Budrus, Body Cargo...
Velemara - Abysmia is really great, but didn't listen to it very often in the last couple years. Definitely deserves more listening sessions.
All these fit perfectly for browsing through Rimaldas Viksraitis' Grimaces of the weary village book while listening.

By the way, what's going on with Autarkeia or Terror?  Unfortunately not much activity in the last couple years.

moozz

Kazumoto Endo + Kazuma Kubota - Live Recording (Noise Ninja Records)
Short (20min) tape full of intense active Japanese noise. Exactly the thing I like.

Flesh Coffin - Devil Worship In The Slaughterhouse (Out-Of-Body Records)
Half an hour of bliss from Andreas Brandal. This sounds like if it was scripted. A bit cinematic at times but mostly just harsh noise (with hints of HNW) mixed with some harsh field recordings(?). Probably the best thing I have heard from Brandal.

Dead Body Collection / Masturbatory Dysfunction - The Necrophiles (Geräuschmanufaktur)
Full blast HNW. A rumbling WALL, not some hissy ANW experiments or crackle studies. A track from each plus a 30min collaboration.

Baglady

#7183
While on my way to get a bottle of wine yesterday, I stopped by a record store and left with three seven-inches.

FAUX PAS - Støy = Gull 7" (Turgid Animal)
Marhaug and Toft playing noise just for the fun of it. And fun it is! Playful yet not frivolous, and with lots of energy. For some reason I expected this to be all out distorted blasting, but instead it has quite alot of air and space, with each element getting the room it needs. This approach can often result in less punch and drive, but this has plenty of that. Not too far from, say, GOLDEN SERENADES. Great stuff.

LASSE MARHAUG / JOHN WIESE - Continuous Loop Sheep 1997-2017 7" (Pica Disk)
A mail collaborration made at the exact same time on June 6th, 1997, but never released back then. Master tape found in 2014, and then edited in 2017 by both artists, 20 years later on the exact same day. Side A has Wiese treating Marhaugs' sounds. Similar to the FAUX PAS 7" above, it has lot's of air, with loops of various timbre circling around eachother but never getting too tangled up and cluttered. Side B has Marhaug treating Wieses' sounds. Heavy distorted snappy cutup of loops (though you get no sense of the loops due to them being so... cutup). Nice work, and a good contrast to side A. Have a feeling I'll be returning to this alot.

SMELL & QUIM - Scum-Grief flexi 7" (Flaccid House)
I found this in the back of a shoebox underneath the pop/rock LP crates. Flexi from 1989, an early one. Nasty stapled cover displaying a cock split in half. I expected the more crazy and wack S&Q, but this is closer in nature to their rather untypical and subdued second album, The Jissom Killers. Here Milovan and Paul sound like as if ART ENSEMBLE OF CHICAGO were covering METGUMBNERBONE, or something. Demented flutes (or whatever it might be) wailing sadly to the steady beat of a distant kettle-drum, with various rattling sounds appearing along the way. Eerie lobotomized march music. Great sound too (for being a flexi that is). Comes very cheap on discogs. Recommended!

Peterson

V/A "Arson" CS (Team Boro Tapes, 2017)
        I'm sure many reading already have this, but since I'm late to the game and digging what Team Boro does, gonna review it anyway. I'll start by saying I find it very refreshing that the label has found a way to apply a nicely violent and taboo theme without relying on the usual perversity, narcoterrorism, or political dog-whistling (not that I have any real objection to any of that). And what better than arson for a tape that's bound to be primarily harsh noise?
        Side A: First up is Tied Hands, who usually do a sort of all-over-the-place mixture of noise, field recordings and "experimental" if I'm not mistaken. Here, we get a sort of tinny and "small" sounding take on HN that is pleasantly sandy/gritty (track concerns a maniac cop turned spree killer). Next is VMS Elit with a crunchy, brittle HN piece that doesn't skimp on ringing high-end; should appeal to fans similar stuff like Quack Quack/Milos Olympus. Following that is Heinz Hopf, with whom I'm kind of underwhelmed as I must admit I generally like the principals' solo efforts much, much more. As usual, things are so saturated as to compress the sense of space I feel their tracks would generally do better to retain. Nice screeching high end of course, but there is a reason I'm partial to Johannson, Nystrand, and Anderson on their own. Onto a contribution from Schakalens Bror – feeling dumb for not having looked into this project earlier as I'm really enjoying the emphasis on texture over volume here: broken, very detailed, acoustic-emphasis kind of stuff; amazing work – not so much Harsh Noise as just noise. Next up is Factory Farming with yet another piece whose sample I can't make out due to the language barrier – oh well, I'm really liking the semi-rhythmic Slogun-clone PE approach; excellent static texture and perhaps the longest piece so far. After that, Legless blasts in with his fairly usual speaker-filling, high-presence decayed roaring HN, has a certain Richard Ramirez-type feel to it, not a bad thing in this case (and great background alarm throbbing oscillations). Lastly, we get Death Dealer doing, well, more HN but with a layered and dynamic (yet still blown-out, saturated, and compressed) take on HN despite still being no-fi as hell. Nice cuts/shifts and a tasty machine-whirring tone as backbone make this piece one of my favorites. Weird pitch-shifted singing sample bleeding through underneath is effectively eerie.
        Side B: Kicks off with People's Person taking a more spacious, high-mid approach with an amazing "container reverb" before the avalanche of crunch rains down. Disturbing "moaning" tone underneath, excellent layering and timing for this piece. Second entry is Current Worming whose brand of harsh noise + industrial tape muck is on display with a barreling, cavernous track that sounds as if the reverb was emphasized due to over-saturation. Just the right amount of buzzing low-key rhythmic grime to make the track recognizable as who was responsible for it (although you could mistake it for Dead Body Love). I would have bought the tape for this submission alone but of course knew the others would match up. After that, Friendly Face's  (who get the award for best track title, "Zippo") cascading flamethrower HN is hard to distinguish from Dealer and Hopf from the previous side but delivers some seriously amazing feedback spraying out along with the blasting mid-range molten asphalt which cools to one thin static line in concluding. Implicit Ruin, next, have a super-primitive take on industrial with a hammering rhythm, one-two high-end noise wave as melody, and bursts of wet synth fluttering in occasionally. Vocals are enraged and of course heavily flanged. Oddly, when the vocals start, the metal percussion shifts to sort of random pinging – I can't help but like this sort of wacky take on PE, which crescendos into primitive harsh noise cut-up with great reverberation. The next piece, whom I'll assume is Ü Golem with a quiet, sputtering crackle wall piece with a flattened bass flowing underneath – the most tape-decayed out of a number of projects whose main component seems to be cassette gain and over-saturation. Another one of my favorite pieces for the entire comp, as I really enjoy the somewhat "thinner" HNW style of whichever project this is, Vast Glory, and certain tracks by The Rita. The next track is yet another intense wall of static but with a sort of "cosmic" or esoteric feel due to the almost-melodic tonal synth drone in background along with the foreground WH-style high-end flutter. Most likely Urban Bushmen, something of an idiosyncratic, refreshing approach for a project with such a great name. Finally, we have a piece from Arkhe, which as 90% of the pieces before it, relies on a linear approach and static grime, droning away consistently much like the previous project (and sounding quite different from the Arkhe on other releases I own in doing so). Not the best material for that project and not an amazing closing track for a compilation but what can you do?
        As a closing note, I'll use a term I normally hate and say this comp is really well "curated" as far as track length and order – doesn't feel as if any project got short shrift or too much leeway with unduly long tracks, either. I can think of some projects that would've felt at home here but perhaps would've just been more of the same, so the economical and efficient choice of C66 is great. Neither side feels like the 33 minutes which comprise it, both moving quickly and staying engaging. Where's Bloated Slutbag when you need him?

Mark Vernon "Orphaned Works" CS (Research Laboratories, 2019)
        Another great collection from the current god of tape archaeology. Using similar found-sound materials as his Lend An Ear and Remnant Kings releases, Vernon here again evokes incredible emotion and atmosphere in what amounts to a diverse collection of relatively short pieces. We get of course detailed clanks and clunks amidst the sound of all manner of interior spaces along with fragments of instructional tapes, dictations, and anonymous thrift-store home recordings (somebody turned 16 on Friday, October 13th 1989, if you're the superstitious type) among much more. Overall has an ethereal, haunted character as complimented by the 4AD-like cover art/layout. More composed than collaged, they differ from Lend An Ear while retaining a similar intimate feel. The emphasis on structure at times veers toward his work in the duo Vernon & Burns. One of the better details is the use of hyper-processed voice wizardry, not unlike Valerio Triccoli or "The Floor Above" by Mercury Hall. Vernon's added acoustic work is of course also absolutely gorgeous and spectral. Has a distinct (by chance only, mind you!) HNAS/Heemann/Ultra vibe at times. Criminally-small edition which I understand is nearly sold-out, so visit Mark's YouTube channel to stream it: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCle7IUOlgIRqFOOLBTDS9gA

Duncan Harrison "Life Is Not a Succession of Major Events" CS (Research Laboratories, 2019)
        A genuinely challenging and off-putting experimental work from an artist I greatly admire. Discovering Duncan's work for myself, I was at first blown away by the incredible detail and variation, everything worked and reworked to perfect execution. Though the latter is still the case, the former not as much, with recent works having a more deliberate sense of unity, even minimalism. This is most so here, with "Life Is Not..." comprising of high-gain, loud blown-out cuts from what sounds like almost accidental or incidental field recordings. Side A has a sort of numbing repetition (often like life itself) using clunky looping edits with some layered voice snippet interjections. Infinitely approaching zero would be the most apt abstract description, I think. On Side B, we have drawings from the same pool of source recordings, with a more varied, cut-up/collaged style, emphasizing an amazing use of syllabic voice edits. Here, the experience is more akin to walking through the lengthy subways of Boston while moving forward over a long distance. I suspect there are also other details aside from the field recordings mentioned but they are merely complimentary sheen to the main component. Totally immersive listening yet throroughly no-entertainment dismal Brit masochism. For fans of: Jeph Jerman, The Haters, Euronet.

Active Denial s/t CS (Cheap Food Records, 2017)
        Quirky Brit PE which, as far as I can tell, avoids the usual sex murder and questionable politics in favor of a more, I don't know, personal, obscure, or esoteric approach. Esoteric in the more general sense of the word than implying connotations of mysticism, as here the requisite spite is of course present as PE mostly should be. In a way, it sort of has the bleak romanticism of lo-fi black metal, just without the instruments. Thin, primitive synth electronics go from droning to static to bi-tonal sub-rhythmic over six tracks on one side, most of which bleed together to a degree. The vocal performance, present only on some tracks, gives an impression of a very young PB doing vocals in a fictitious, alternate-reality demo version of Total Sex or Birthdeath Experience. So minimal as to be not remarkably memorable but good stuff; a few shades better than the underwhelming, minimal, quiet "PE" coming out of the US like Pleasure Island, Alba Cell and so on. Fans of Forza Albino, Menacing '84/Roases, and Intersp3c!es 3rotica (a one-off PE project from Moral Defeat label out of Denmark which should have recorded more material). I hope to see more from this project simply as I'm curious what it'd sound like.