Posts Tagged ‘Album Review’

Look To The North – A Shadow Homeland

Posted: 10 December 2023 in Albums
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Cruel Nature Recordings – 24th November 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

The brief accompanying biography tells us that ‘Look To The North is the ‘dronefolk’ duo comprising David Colohan (United Bible Studies, Raising Holy Sparks) and Zachary Corsa (Nonconnah, Lost Trail)’, and that ‘Recorded in 2021, A Shadow Homeland is 4 tracks of atmospheric other-worldly introspection; melancholic ambience interspersed with sparse piano, spoken word and field-recordings, creating an immersive transcendental twilit experience.

We’re immediately in with what initially sounds like some form of narrative, and joining as we do seemingly in the middle of it, it’s difficult to orientate oneself in terms of context. Soon, soft droning tones drift in like mist and rings out heraldic over the hills and draping the woodlands with string-like sounds amidst images of clouds and nature, interlaced with spiritual abstractions rich in poeticism, but their meanings obscure. The title of this first composition, ‘Disintegrating Consoles And Cartridges’, has a ‘found sound’ connotation, a suggestion of decaying histories and lost origins, and in time, distant voices mutter almost imperceptibly while piano notes roll in and out. Increasingly I find sparse piano notes which are allowed to resonate conjure the saddest and most bereft of emotional sensations, and by the end of eight minutes, I find myself feeling empty, heavy of heart, and pining for something lost – something I can’t quite recall beyond a vague sensation, like the occasional pang of pining for childhood or people and places left long behind, the melancholia of hazy reminiscences which creep at the fringes of a fugue-like memory.

‘The Water That Shattered Their Image’ feels darker at the start, Not necessarily ominous, but there are grainy textures scratching lower in the layers of sound, elongated whisps and broad sonic washes, and they bring a certain discordance and discomfiture. Human voices mingle into wolf-like howls, baying, crazed, before growing hushed, as if in anticipation of the album’s dominating finale, the seventeen-and-a-half-minute ‘An Amulet For The Flux Of Blood’. Here, the piano is very much the central instrument, but surrounded by layers of organ and organic-sounding drones. These sounds coalesce to create a haunting yet smoothly tranquil atmosphere.

To suggest that it seems to share more in common with post-rock than any form of folk is perhaps to pick pedantically at irrelevant details, but I mention this because these genre distinctions have a tendency to set certain expectations. But as elegiac pastoral works, infused with subtle elements of collaging and experimentation, the pieces which make up A Shadow Homeland certainly don’t disappoint, and indeed, confound any expectations one may have. Mood-wise, I’m left feeling uncertain; neither uplifted now downcast, but somewhere in a strange place and a sensation of something missing. It’s neither pleasant nor unpleasant, but remarkable that such understated instrumental works can resonate in such a deep and complex way.

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Hanging Freud – Worship

Posted: 9 December 2023 in Albums
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Spleen+ (Alfa Matrix) – 1st December 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

Christmas has come early this year, with an absolute deluge of releases landing on1st December, many from acts I like or am otherwise keen to hear. Hanging Freud are in the former bracket, and Worship marks their seventh album release, following 2021’s Persona Normal.

The duo have established themselves as purveyors of premium-quality dark, stark, gothy electro, and with Worship, they solidify their position with aplomb. Persona Normal was recorded at a leisurely pace between 2018 and-2020, and, like so many other releases in the last couple of years, Worship was written and recorded during the pandemic and under lockdown conditions, and the accompanying notes lay out both the contents and context in further detail:

‘The 10 songs featured on this album literally come from a place of contradiction hanging somewhere between courageous vulnerability and fearful resilience, and deal with themes such as collective distress and loss, finding beauty in tragedy or yet questioning about what makes us human in the symbolic contrasts of life and death…. It’s no surprise to hear that this “less is more” introspective ode to melancholia was written in particular claustrophobic circumstances during the pandemic lockdown. “Because of what was going on, we were essentially stuck in temporary accommodation in Scotland, away from our studio and forced into a period unexperienced before. The songs that came out therefore come from a different place. Everything was done within a laptop and is proudly 100% digital. It was recorded and mixed while literally sitting on the side of a bed in a mouse infested apartment…” explains Paula Borges.’

If it sounds like a grim and oppressive set of circumstances for creating art of any kind, then the singles which prefaced the album have set the tone and expectation, while affirming the claustrophobic intensity of the music which emerged from these challenging conditions.

The result is a hybrid of Siouxsie and 17 Seconds era Cure with a hefty dose of New Order’s Movement and dash of Editors circa On This Light and On This Evening. Reference points may be lazy journalism, but they serve a purpose. While this album stands alone like an icy obelisk, singular and a monument to the darkest introversions, some musical context is probably useful for discursive purposes.

The stark ‘Falling Tooth’ is as bleak and haunting as it gets: Paula’s vocals are breathy but theatrical, pitched over a strolling squelchy synth bass and a vintage-synth sound that wanders around over just a few notes, while ‘I pray we keep the world’ is low, slow, sparse, and lugubrious, as well as emotionally taut, and dominated by a truly thunderous drum sound. ‘This Day’ is particularly drum-heavy, withy only gloomy, droning synths sweeping through a heavy mist of atmosphere.

There are some who bemoan the use of drum machines, and who complain that they lack the vibe of a live drummer. Hell, there are contributors to forums and groups devoted to The Sisters of Mercy who question why they don’t get a real drummer, some forty-two years on from their inception. These people are missing the point. Drum machines can do things that human drummers can’t, and one of those is how drum machines can be louder, heavier, more monotonous than a live drummer. And in context for certain music, this can be a real asset, accentuating the sensation of dehumanised detachment of synth music that sits at the colder end of the spectrum. And Worship is one of those albums which will leave you with chapped lips.

It’s against brittle snare cracks and sweeping synths that Paula claws her way through complex emotions, and where the lyrics aren’t immediately decipherable, the haunting vocal delivery is heavy with implicit meaning. It resonates beyond words alone. Everything is paired back to the barest minimum, exposing the darkest recesses of the psyche.

Standing alone as a single, ‘A hand to gold the gun’ was bleak and heavy. Sitting in the middle of the album, this sensation is amplified, accentuated, and the gracefulness of the vocals as they drape around the broad washes of sound which surge and well is that of a dying swan.

‘Her Joy’ is perhaps the least joyful thing you’re likely to hear in a while, and if ‘Beyond’ feels somewhat uplifting, it’s only because it’s a flickering candle flame in an endlessly dark tunnel, as devoid of air as light. The mood is heavy, and presses on the chest, slowly pressing the air out and crushing the spirit, and as the album progresses, the effect is cumulative. By the time we arrive at the piano-led ‘Don’t save yourself for him’, I feel my shoulders sagging and my back hunched forward from the endless weight of this.

Worship is a masterful exercise in poise and restraint, a work which conveys the purest essence of isolation, of desolation.

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A.L. Lacey – Lesson

Posted: 6 December 2023 in Albums
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Human Worth – 8th December 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

It’s only a bit of a brag – and a collateral one, at that – to say I’ve followed the Human Worth label since its inception. There’s a contextual reason to mention it, namely that while I’ve long raved about their being consistent in their selection of all things noisy, Human Worth isn’t a label with a ‘house’ style devoted to any one strain of music of an overdriven guitar nature. One need look no further than then recently-released angular indie noise-rock hybrid of Beige palace’s Making Sounds for Andy for evidence of that. It’s most definitely an ‘alternative’ record, in that it’s a million miles from the mainstream, but it’s not particularly noisy.

A. L. Lacey’s mid-bill placing on the label’s recent eight-act extravaganza in Leeds was an inspired one, as her graceful tunes provided the perfect respite from predominantly noisy guitar-based acts, and her performance set my level of anticipation for her album, Lesson.

It’s a landmark release for both Alice and Human Worth: having long established herself as a contributor to numerous acts in her locale of Bristol, Alice explains how “there was a frustrating sense of unfinished business. In that, my piano parts and ideas were being restricted to someone else’s’ vision – a vision which was often ‘less is more’ – a tasteful afterthought… A huge part of this project therefore became the need to challenge myself and to see what I could achieve or lessons I could learn, if I did things my own way – a bit of a journey towards autonomy – a predominant theme in most of my songs, along with finding purpose from confusion, and strength in your weaknesses.”

Lesson, then, is Lacey’s statement of identity, as she steps out from the shadows of other people’s work to present herself and her own musical ideas. And what’s striking is just how eclectic the album’s nine songs are.

‘Sewn’ opens up with rolling piano propelled by a vintage drum machine sound that’s pure late 70s/early 80s. But if this evokes the lo-fi sparseness and simplicity of Young Marble Giants, her vocals, swathed in reverb and strong yet delicate, are equal parts folk and shoegaze. And yet for all these elements, Lacey creates a maximal expansiveness with minimal instrumentalism. With swells of energy, it’s a soaring, uplifting piece, which hooks the listener immediately into the unique world she conjures with her magical fingers and tuneful voice.

It paves the way for eight further slices of creatively crafted musicality that combines elements of neoclassical, folk, and experimentalism. ‘Complaint’ is exemplary: the instrumentation is sparse, subtle, a soft wash of thrumming, droning synths underpinned by an insistent but understated beat. Incidental sounds weave in and out, creating depth, while Lacey’s multi-tracked voice is simultaneously trad folky and otherworldly.

There’s an energy and pace to many of the songs on Lesson which are far from the kind of bland, plodding fare common to many singer-songwriter types: ‘Memo’ may be but a brief note, but has the vintage pop vibes of Stereolab as it breezes on through and makes its mark. Elsewhere, the title track is wistful, swooning, without being remotely twee, and ‘Home’ brings post-rock dramatics to the proceedings. Bold yet understated, ‘Paper’ is worthy of all the airplay, and would sit comfortably on soundtracks and being performed at arena shows alike, being accessible, easy on the ear, hooky, emotive, and –

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Perhaps because she’s been doing this for a lot longer than the arrival of a debut would imply, Alice’s accomplishment as both a musician and a composer shine through every moment of this spellbinding collection of songs: the attention to detail the nuances of the playing and the production only accentuate the multi-faceted qualities of her songwriting and performance. It all adds up to a uniquely special album.

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Mari Boine – Gula Gula – H​ø​r Stamm​ø​drenes Stemme

Posted: 5 December 2023 in Albums
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By Norse Music – 1st December 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

First released in 1989, Gula Gula was Mari Boine’s second album proved to be her breakthrough, earning her a Norwegian Grammy award and providing the gateway to a career which continues over thirty years later as an international voice for the Sámi peoples. The album, originally self-released, would later come to the attention of Peter Gabriel, who would release it worldwide on his label Real World Records in 1993. But 1993 was twenty years ago already, and there are many – including myself – who will be unacquainted with this album, or even Boine’s work. This reissue comes with the added bonus of two previously unreleased tracks from the Gula Gula studio sessions which were only recently discovered.

That the songs of Gula Gula are primarily sung in the Northern Sámi language is both unusual and significant, being key to what her bio described as ‘the fight of preserving the culture of the Norwegian Sami people and the natural world. Two matters that lie close to Mari’s heart and are still threatened to this day. The indigenous people have a wisdom that says that the earth is our mother, and if she is harmed, we are harming ourselves.’

These feel more salient now than ever, as we witness the effects of global climate change and a world riven with cultural conflicts whereby dominant cultures continue to oppress and obliterate older, indigenous cultures in the name of ‘progress’ – as if the most brutal applications of capitalism are the only way. This album’s reissue happens to land in the same week that Israel resumed its onslaught to decimate the whole of Gaza in the name of defending itself against a minority terrorist organisation, while the UK government slammed down some truly brutal plans to slash immigration under the premise of benefiting the economy. This determination to stamp out difference is diabolical, but somehow accepted as reasonable by many. But in taking such destructive paths, it should be apparent that the harm goes far deeper and wider than the claimed intent. Similarly, those who vent their ire against the likes of Just Stop Oil and XR for employing methods which are disruptive and argue that these methods turn people off from their message are missing the point that a) non-disruptive protest hasn’t achieved anything like enough b) there should be no debate when it comes to their message. What they’re objecting to, then, ultimately, is that these protesters are trying to force them to face uncomfortable truths. The saddest fact is that those objecting to the protests don’t give a fuck and just want to get on with driving their SUVs to the McDonald’s drive-thru.

So, at the heart of Mari Boine’s songs is a certain tension which may not always be immediately apparent from their melodic musicality, especially if you’re not fluent in Northern Sámi. For that, you can be forgiven, and whether or not you’re versant in the sociopolitical aspects of their context, it’s easy to appreciate the music on a more superficial level.

The songs of Gula Gula are quite simply arranged, and are, fundamentally, manifestations of folk music. But while the instrumentation is predominantly acoustic, and serves to provide a backing to Mari’s voice, which while always melodic, shows at times a stirring degree of ferocity and passion, as on ‘Vilges Suola’ while the piano-led ‘Eadnán Bákti’ is a soft ballad. ‘It Šat Duolmma Mu’ brings both raw power and some intricate musicianship melded to a thumping subterranean groove.

‘Oppskrift for Herrefolk’ (‘Recipe for a Master Race’) finds Mari singing in Norwegian on the album’s most overtly political song. Musically, it marks something of a departure, too, with a screeching 80s rock guitar solo slicing through the trilling folksiness. It’s almost as if it’s there to reinforce a point. And it works. It’s worth considering for a moment that there are places where such a song could lead to arrest, and worse. This isn’t to say that the Sámi have it easy, but to highlight the fact that these struggles are real and often go widely unreported, unacknowledged, the voices unheard.

Whether taken in, or out, of context, Gula Gula is an enchanting and powerful album.

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Neuro… No Neuro – Positive*

Posted: 2 December 2023 in Albums
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Mille Plateaux – 1st December 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

It’s always exciting to hear what electronic experimentalism Neuro… No Neuro have cooked up, and Positive* is the second album this year, following on from the collection of glitchy snippets which comprised Compartments back in January. Just as Compartments was a very different project from its predecessor, Faces & Fragments, so Positive* explores very different territory from the ‘Kawaii-Glitch’ of Compartments.

As the accompanying notes explain, ‘Positive* by Neuro… No Neuro is based upon thin slices of memory, and the disintegration of their existence. The day-to-day, with its ‘ups and downs’, all while operating/existing above and to the right of the body. When the day ends, and the separated is reunited; how does one collect what is no longer there? …Separating consciousness from the corporeal… Memory and thought are being swept out to sea in granules that are imperceptible to those around you. Short term is riddled with inconsistencies…Say “so long” to the granules.’

It’s all about focus, and the focus of Positive* is very different from any previous projects. And when it comes to projects like this, details are important. In context, it’s ok to focus on those details, and to do so isn’t obsessive or excessively picky, but to engage with a creative work on the basis of its design, its intent. I preface my assessment this way because the first thing I’m drawn to, before hearing a single note, is the asterisk in the title. Such a mark denotes a footnote, an aside, a necessary commentary on the subject.

But there is not one appended to the accompanying notes. What can it mean? Is this an accidental omission? It seems unlikely, and as such, one can only conclude that it’s for the reader to decipher the nature of the discourse. In my own experience of academic writing, it’s often the case that the real commentary and the grain of the research lies in the notes, and so it is the case here.

‘This Time for Sure’ brings some stuttering ambient drum ‘n’ bass which arrives in a drift of Japanese-inspired scales, bit there are some subtle details and textures to be found low down in the mix. It certainly sets the tone for this comparatively delicate collection of pieces, most of which are fairly fleeting, sitting around the two-and-a-half-minute mark on average.

Each of the titles pins a positive slant on neutral or even potentially negative scenarios – ‘Even I can See this Now’, ‘When You Actually Want to Wake Up’, ‘Drier days Ahead’ – all feel like phrases uttered the kind of pep talks you might give yourself in times of struggle. C’mon, you can do this! Sometimes, try as you might, it still feels empty and futile, and as oft as you repeat it, you struggle to believe it.

‘When You Actually Want to Wake Up’ perhaps represents this struggle most keenly, a loping glitch like the back and forth internal monologue you struggle to overcome: yes… no… yes… no… just get up… but…’

‘Of Course You Know it All’ has an implied snarky, snideness to its title, but it’s still positive, right? Its glitchy, picky, chiming mellowness float beneath some pinging arcs, while the sweeping ambience of ‘Almost Through’ arrives with a sense of sagging fatigue, the kind of positivity many feel in the last half hour of the working week – fagged out and clinging to that point of release.

The world is dark and life is a grind, and it’s often difficult to see the light, the positive aspects among it all – and they are few and far between. Platitudes like ‘at least I have a job’ or ‘at least I have my health’ don’t really carry much conviction. Sure, there’s always someone worse off, but it’s hardly saying much. It’s ok to be negative, to be discontent.

And perhaps it’s here we finally come to understand and appreciate the asterisk. Positive* is, overall, melodic, and feels quite uplifting, being gentle, the urgent beats tempered by ambience and melodicism. It’s actually – dare I say it – quite nice. But finding those uptempo, upbeat aspects, maintaining balance, is hard as you juggle and struggle to keep things together, a day at a time. And perhaps this is how we can best appreciate Positive*. Just as memory drifts and floats, so does our capacity to continue onwards and to stay afloat. All you can do is hang in there.

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Palmer ++ Procter – what does the fjord say and what do we say in reply?

Posted: 1 December 2023 in Albums
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Dret Skivor – 1st December 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

Yes, that’s fjord, not fox, meaning you won’t find these collaborating sound artists bouncing around the woods dressed as furry animals, making daft, random sounds. Well, you won’t find them bouncing around the woods dressed as furry animals, anyway, although Dave Procter did spend many years performing while wearing a latex pig’s head, but he put a stop to that after David Cameron started turning up at his shows.

This latest collaboration between Martin Palmer and Dave Procter is, in fact, inspired by the site of previous experimental audio tests in 2019, namely the sculpture “what does the fjord say?” in Trondheim harbour. As they tell it in the accompanying notes, ‘Armed with percussive sticks, contact microphones, audio recorders and the occasional toy and synth, they set about a full exploration of the sculpture and their own sonic ideas in and around the sculpture, using created and environmental sounds to answer the question posed by the sculpture. These recordings are Palmer and Procter’s replies.’

The first reply ‘støyende arbeider’ is more of a lecture than a simple reply, with a running time of twenty-one minutes. Consisting of random clatters, crashes, squidges, squelches and shifting hums which ebb and flow amongst an array of incidental intrusions, it’s more of a non-linear rambling explication, and exploration of the rarely-explored recesses of the mind than a cogent conclusion. But then, why should a reply necessarily be an answer. This, then, is a dialogue, a discussion, not an interview constructed around a Q&A format. It’s nothing so formal, and all the more interesting for its being open-ended, evolving organically. There are points at which the thuds, clanks and scrapes grow in their intensity, creating a sense of frustration, as if attempting to unravel a most complex conundrum and finding oneself stuck and annoyed by the fact that there is something just out of reach, something you can’t quite recall. And at times, this is also the listener’s experience. The way to approach this is by giving up on the expectation or hope of coherence, or anything resembling a tune, and yield to the spirit of experimentalism.

‘Moose Cavalry’ and ‘Mock Paloma’ are both significantly shorter pieces, the former being atmospheric and evocative, the animalistic calls conjuring images of beats roaming moorlands in the mist. Plaintive, droning moans and lows transmogrify into warped, pained cries and needling drones. The latter is different again: dark, tense, shrill tones scratch and scrape, flit and fly, reverberating from all directions. It’s unsettling, uncomfortable.

These three compositions are so different from one another, it superficially makes for a somewhat disjointed set, but on deeper reflection, what Palmer and Procter have forged a work which demonstrates how it’s possible, and even desirable, to approach a subject from multiple angles and perspectives. I still don’t know what the fjord says, but I do know that Palmer and Procter have posed some interesting musings in response.

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ZAHN – Adria

Posted: 19 November 2023 in Albums
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Crazysane Records – 24th Nov 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

The press release describes Zahn as a ‘German post–modern noise rock ensemble’, while their bandcamp bio offers ‘A bold escape from your daily life through technicolor transmissions of post–rock, krautrock, dark jazz, noise–rock, post–punk and electronic music. Influenced by the likes of TRANS AM, THE JESUS LIZARD, METZ, THE MELVINS and TORTOISE’, adding that ‘Adria is a compelling soundtrack to a 1980’s anti–utopian road movie!’

As a prospect, it’s head-spinning, sounding like an everything-all-at-once hybrid, and the actuality isn’t much different. There are plenty of driving grooves, largely propelled by solid bass and insistent drumming, but there are also some angular riffs and big splashes of noise.

The first track, ‘Zebra,’ boasts a bulbous bass with some big low-end and some easy, noodly synths which wibble and wander agreeably and mellifluously… and then towards the end it builds and distorts and things get altogether more twisted and less pleasant. And this is a feature characteristic of the compositions on show here. They don’t mash everything into every second simultaneously, and there’s none of that jazz / Beefheart kind of stuff that sounds like each band member is playing a different tune in a different key and time signature all at the same time. There are times where that kind of avant-gardism most definitely has its place, and works, but this isn’t what Zahn are doing here. In keeping with the road movie concept, the pieces are constructed around transition.

The ten-minute ‘Schmuck’ is a magnificent example of their ability to do mellow, with clean sounds and even a tinge of a country twang, it swings along breezily and evokes sunshine and expansive vistas. Then, near the seven-minute mark, the bass steps up to a crunching grind and things get a whole lot noisier, from where it builds into a big, driven riff which crackles with energy. ‘Yuccatan 3E’ is another colossus of a cut, running to almost nine and a half minutes and manages to take it time in pushing outwards and working a single passage for a fair while, but equally packs in at least three or four songs’ worth of ideas.

The changes feel organic, and sometimes emerge gradually, and at others there will be a sudden and unexpected swerve, and there’s so much happening that the absence of vocals barely registers.

Because the mood, tone, and tempo differs so radically between songs – and between sections – Adria very much does feel like a journey, through space and time. ‘Apricot’ is a sparse synth work with crispy vintage drum machine snare cutting through quavering analogue synth sounds – then, without changing the instrumentation or the simple repetitive motif, it goes massive. A post-rock Depeche Mode chronically undersells it, but it’s as close as I can get, at least off the top of my head. The final minute is an extravagant climax, and truly magnificent.

The majority of the album’s eleven tracks run past five minutes, with the majority sitting more around the seven-minute mark, but the eleven-and-a-half-minute ‘Faser’ is the album’s megalithic centrepiece. It blasts hard with a fuzzy, scuzzy repetitive riff cycle with stoner rock tendencies, and it’s dynamic and exhilarating. Dropping down to bubbling synths in the breakdown around six minutes in, the threat of a re-emergence of the heavy lingers suspensefully. When it does land, it does so with a vengeance, before transitioning once more into something altogether different again, skittering its way into Krautrock territory.

The power blast of ‘Tabak’ hits square between the eyes and feels unexpected however expected it actually is. These guys are absolute masters of the unpredictable and varied structure, and conjure some highly evocative and atmospheric passages, and while the playing is technical, it’s not technical for its own sake: there’s nothing showy or extravagant, and the focus is very much on the compositions, the structures, and the impact. ‘Amaranth’ piledrives a full-on doom riff, slogging away at it for what feel like an eternity. It’s a heavy trudge, and really hits the spot – again, when you least expect it.

Adria straddles many, many genres, and does so in a way that’s incredibly imaginative. The key to its success is its execution, which balances precision with passion.

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we be echo – Do Not Switch On

Posted: 18 November 2023 in Albums
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23rd November 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

Dark post punk and music of a gothy persuasion appears to be enjoying – if enjoyment is an accurate description – of late. Dark times call for dark music, and the echoes of the 80s which resonate in the presents are deep. As financial turmoil continues to bite hard – and hardest on those who struggle the most – and war rages around the world, the new state of cold war which hovers has been relegated to a mere shadow in the background, bur remains very real. Add climate change and constant surveillance, massive inflation, and a global political shift to the right to the mix, and we have the perfect cocktail for an explosion of music which channels dissent and frustration.

But what goes around comes around, and it’s a truism that if you stick with what you’re doing long enough, it will inevitably come back into fashion at some point. And so here we are presented with Do Not Switch On, the latest offering from we be echo.

Canadian Kevin Thorne has been doing what he does for a long time. As he set out in his bio, ‘I formed Third Door From The Left with Raye Coluori in 1979. I left to form we be echo in 1981, and released Ceza Evi on cassette and contributed to several compilations. I’m still recording now, some 40 plus years later. And what do you know? The world has come back around and caught up with his mode of musical output once more.

Do Not Switch On is straight in with bass that snakes and crunches: ‘Cold Rain Gun’ is dark, dank, weighty and throbs away as Thorne paints a word-portrait of a bleak and dangerous world. Depressingly, any depiction of near-future dystopias are more or less the reality in which we find ourselves.

Instrumentally, ‘At You, Because’ sounds like a cut from The Jesus and Mary Chain’s Honey’s Dead, with a driving bass and shuffling beats locking down a solid groove. The same is largely rue of the pulsating psychedelic throb of ‘Sometimes’, which calls to mind the cyclical stylings of Pink Turns Blue, only with more bass – much more bass – and more noise – much more noise.

‘Grey, Grey’ is a blistering riff-driven tune, and it’s swampy, dark, dense, with a tinge of not only psychedelia but of swampy surf. For all that, The Black Angels stand as the closest comparisons, at least on this absolute stomper, and hot on its heels, ‘Die For You’ follows the same hypnotic template, a motoric beat thudding away through various explosions of sound while Thorne croaks and croons a monotone amidst the swirling tension, and ‘Sepia’ locks into a groove that feels longer than it is, in a good way. If ‘Shallow Hallow’ leans rather heavily on Bauhaus and ‘R.U.N.’ takes a bit much from both The Black Angels and the Sisters of Mercy simultaneously, it works.

Do Not Switch On is a solid album, and that’s a fact. Most of the tracks run past the five-minute mark and drive away at a single repetitive riff for the duration. But within what may appear to be limited confines, Thorne really wrings a lot out of what is, in real terms, a minimal setup.

This stuff never ceases to excite, either live or recorded. Do Not Switch On is solid, and nags and gnaws unexpectedly.

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Sun Color Sound – Ritual One (Climbing the Fire into the Sky)

Posted: 17 November 2023 in Albums
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Mind Altering Records – 13th November 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

Back at the start of 2021, I penned a pretty positive review of the solarminds album Her Spirit Cracked the Sky. The combination of ambience and extreme weight was a thrilling proposition. And it was – and still is – monumentally epic. It feels a long time ago already, and much has happened in the interim. If emerging from the pandemic was trailed for a long time by the release of myriad ‘lockdown’ projects, we’ve subsequently trickled into a ‘world’s turned to shit’ phase, and like the pandemic, it feels like there’s no end in sight. Trump may be out of office, but he still looms large and continues to pose a threat in the arena of world politics, and it’s a world at war, and a world where alternately wild fires and floods decimate swathes of land. Slowly but surely, the planet is becoming less inhabitable. And yet, still, people jet off on skiing holidays and bemoan the lack of snow despite being the cause of the lack of snow, and whenever it rains, people take to their cars to make five-minute journeys to avoid getting wet, thus ensuring it will rain an awful lot more in the time to come.

And since the release of Her Spirit Cracked the Sky, after more than a decade, Chris Miner has put the project to bed. But, like the proverbial phoenix rising from the ashes, he now returns with Sun Colour Sound, and the first in a projected trilogy of releases. On the evidence of this first one, it will be something special.

Ritual One (Climbing the Fire into the Sky) consists of a single piece, which runs just short of half an hour, and it shares many elements with solarminds – namely a fair bit of noise, some hefty guitars and punishing percussion, at least in the first two thirds, and it’s heavy, harsh, noisy, and it crashes straight in with some grating, heavy drone, twisting feedback and thudding drums.

This is one of those tracks which stars like the end of many sets, and it feels like it’s winding down from the offing. This is by no means a criticism, simply an observation that what in the context of many works is a climactic, tempestuous crescendo finale, is simply the start of a ferocious sonic storm. It does very much call to mind Sunn O))) and the epic, swirling instrumental passages of contemporary Swans, although the guitars are very much geared towards generating howling feedback rather than crushing, clashing chords that sound like buildings being demolished. Therte’s something of a psychedelic twist in the spacey delivery, too. As whining, whistling notes ring out, the percussion builds from the occasional roll to a relentless thunder. The combination is immensely powerful, and assails the senses with a real physicality. Buy around the thirteen-minute mark, it’s reached wall-of-sound levels, a dense, shimmering sonic force which shimmers and ripples while coming on like a bulldozer, at the same time as hand drums fly at a frantic pace and evoking something spiritual in the midst of a hypnotic frenzy. And still, it goes on, surging forwards.

The shift in the final third occurs subtly: the percussion continues to clatter away, but the guitar abrasion tapers away, to be replaced by altogether softer strings.

Ritual One (Climbing the Fire into the Sky) is more than just a really long piece of music: it’s an ambitious piece in every way, and its scope and scale are immense. There is so much depth and detail here, and it takes repeated listens to really appreciate just how much is happening, especially given that the first reaction is simply to bow to its sheer sonic force.

But the last ten minutes belong to a different world from the first portion. Hypnotic, soothing, graceful, the tension dissipates and Eastern vibes radiate through the gauze-like layers which drift and float over the busy but altogether more subdued percussion.

So while it is an ambitious work, it also delvers far above any expectations, and it’s both unique and special.

AA

Version 3

Flesh Field – Voice of the Echo Chamber

Posted: 6 November 2023 in Albums
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Metropolis Records – 3rd November 2023 (Digital) / 17th November 2023 (CD)

Christopher Nosnibor

Ian Ross’ electro-industrial project Flesh Field emerges, quite unexpectedly, from almost two decades of dormancy, twenty years in mute, to deliver ‘A concept work with each of its ten tracks representing stages of political radicalisation and violence, Ross states in the CD booklet that “believing falsehoods because those falsehoods reinforce our preferred narratives is not harmless. Promoting falsehoods to benefit your faction is not harmless, particularly in a well-armed society. If we remain locked in our own echo chambers, inevitably there will a voice of the echo chamber that speaks in the language of mass murder, believing it justified. This album describes that tragic inevitability.”

It’s not hard to ascertain ‘why now?’ While I’ve long become weary of the endless and continuing stream of ‘lockdown projects’ emerging, it’s a fair assessment that the pandemic did change everything. Confined, pressurised, and subjected to a relentless bombardment of news media, government ‘information’ and directives, and often with only social media for company beyond the four walls of home imprisonment, people struggled to separate fact from misinformation and conspiracy, reality from fiction and imagination.

I first really noticed the echo chamber some time before, in 2016, with the Brexit referendum in June, swiftly followed by the election of Donald Trump as US president in November. Both results seemed not only implausible, but nigh on impossible. No-one I knew or spoke to supported either as far as I knew – why would anyone vote for either of these outcomes? But against a backdrop of simmering tensions and social divisions and a general melee of things being pretty fucked, these seemingly unimaginable things came to pass. I would subsequently learn that relatives had voted in favour of Brexit ‘to see what would happen’. Fucking Boomers who won’t be around to live through the worst of the fallout. And this is how it goes when you have ageing populations and a swing towards the right in uncertain times. People seek to protect their own interests rather than the greater good. It doesn’t necessarily mean that echo chambers perpetuate falsehoods, but they do most certainly create confirmation bias, foster complacency, and distort reality by creating a bubble. And now… there is no way Ross could have predicted the dark turn that would assail the Middle East just a few short weeks ago. The divisions surrounding this conflict reverberate around the globe. And we watch. And we watch. It’s simply more TV, more unreality to many.

During Flesh Field’s protracted period of inactivity, their work continues to spread, like a fungus, or to perhaps use an analogy more akin to their own spheres of reference, like a virus, numerous tracks from their catalogue were placed in the soundtracks of films including the just released The Mill, TV shows such as True Blood and video games like Project Gotham Racing. Sometimes, being away is the best promotion.

But there couldn’t be a more appropriate time for Flesh Field to return, and Voice of the Echo Chamber is a powerful document reflecting these difficult times. The opening track, ‘

Crescendo’ stars strong, with a cacophony of babbling voices, before thunderous percussion and bold orchestral strikes build big drama. Not since Red Raw and Sore by PIG have I been struck by such a grand intro to an album, and this melds driving metallic guitars, industrial-strength techno beats and seething bombast. It’s a strong cocktail and one that hits the listener right between the eyes, paving the way for a set of ten insistent tracks all driven by loping sequenced synths and thudding hefty beats pushed to the fore and pumping, pulsating hypnotically. The are choral bursts woven into the dense fabric of the compositions, as well as strings and piano and incidental noise: ‘Catalyst’ crunches in with a harsh mechanised grind which gives way to a filly cinematic string segment before the pounding beat slams in and things get dark, like an industrial reimagining of Holst’s ‘Planets’ suite. The vocals are low in the mix and low in the throat. The delivery means the lyrics aren’t always especially audible, but the sentiment and energy is relentlessly loud and clear amidst the grunt, grind, and crackle.

‘Arsenal’ goes big, a gritty anthemic chorus paired with a crunchy industrial verse that draws together elements of NIN, KMFDM, and PIG, to big, big effect, being both attacking and cinematic at the same time. There’s plenty of attack here, but equally, Voice of the Echo Chamber is big on bold, widescreen, cinematic segments. ‘Manifesto’ is a monster, with all the guitars, all the orchestral work, and a relentless beat that hits hard and heavy and it all comes together to create a big, big sound. The pounding ‘Soldier’ is really big on impact, and contrasts well with the brooding, slow-crawling ambience and piano atmospherics of the unexpectedly gentle introduction to ‘Rampage’.

There’s a certain sense of uplifting empowerment to be found in the chorus of the last track, ‘Reset’. Ewe need this glummer of optimism in the face of so much relentless bleakness and gut-crushing darkness, which ends with more crowds, more shouting. You flinch and stall, because it’s too close, too real.

In places harsh and stark despite its enormity, Voice of the Echo Chamber is a strong, relentless, unyielding blast. I feel that this is a time to sit back, let things repercuss in their own time, and step back while Ian Ross blasts distortion, vitriol, and amplifies self-loathing with brutal force. Feel it.

AAAA

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