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søndag den 31. juli 2016
Dosis Letalis - In These Troubled Times
Harsh noise wall is a fairly new subgenre within the realm of noise music. Some have proclaimed that it was pioneered by Sam McKinlay (The Rita) in the late 90s. I felt for this style, mainly of its reason not to be "extreme" like power-electronics, or to overdo your finger skills in harsh-noise. Harsh noise wall is a non-dynamic treatment of static noise with minimal glimpses of hidden textures of images and sound, hidden within a thick distorted wall of noise. Similar ideas have been explored by the likes of Boyd Rice, Haters and the New Blockaders. Now a new genre of wall has been showing it´s ugly face, ambient noise wall. So what the heck is ambient noise wall?. Well, I don't know. All that I can say, is it´s like harsh noise wall with an atmospheric mood. And one of these is Serbian based Dosis Letalis, although I wouldn't actually call it ambient but it sure got lots of atmosphere and mood compared to others. Heard this act through the tape label Grey Matter Production´s Bandcamp site, and fell in love with this release. It grew on me and keeps on growing. In the same way like Earth debut from 1993 (with their sludgy drone/noise rock). Like Earth, the sound almost has a physical presence and it lifts you few cm of the ground (or the couch). It´s an evocative beast of hypnotic relentlessness, keeping your mind and ears at a constant curious state of mind.
With this tape (with cover art and album title), we´re working with a kind of a post-apocalyptic theme of despair and desperate human survival. And Dosis Letalis is the shelter we´re having, against whatever that want´s to hurt us. Makes sense to me. If you are curious about this underground noise genre, then this IS a good start. Dosis Letalis has had several releases under its arm, so be sure to check them out!
I´m a member of the music Facebook forum called Dungeon Synth, and on this very moment, I've become an addict to ancient melodies from forgotten times played out on a synth. From time to time I check up on this forum and find good releases, releases which are good enough to be released on cassette tapes. One of these is Foglord´s 2016 release Winter Dreams out on the label Out of Season. Know this that the Youtube introduction track above this. is not from the Winter Dreams album. But catches the feel 100%! Strange thing that I ordered it on Discogs; neither the band/project name hit me or the album cover art. On Bandcamp Foglord is described as this : "This project is an outlet for my spirit and dreams. It is also a dedication to the spirit of nature and the lands around me; my greatest influences". Which tells me, that this thing could be the worst thing ...... or something really really good. Anyways, I tried my chance and bought it for a decent price on Discogs. And now I am sitting here listening to it, for the third time now and think it´s one heck of a tape!. I fucked up converting my tape and ended up with the B-side to begin with, and I was struck by the first track on the B-side ´Glacial (Secrets Within the Ice)´ that this shit was promising, sounds like Tangerine Dream if they did the theme for David Lynch´s epic gothic sci-fi flick Dune ( and OFFCOURSE it sounds better than bloody Toto!). The cassette moves further into endless, beautiful and cold landscapes well worth the attention for any vintage synth lovers. Almost has this late 80s - start 90s synth and dark ambient retro feel, think early ritualistic Raison D´être or the Italian cosmic icy landscapes of Runes Order. And off course from time to time, there is that minor dark dungeon synth feel from time to time. Not a 100% dungeon synth release but more of a wonderfully atmospheric soundtrack tribute to classic synth vintage acts like Tangerine Dream, Brian Eno or even John Carpenter! This is the fifth cassette release from Foglord, and I will be looking forward to more. A good idea would be 2 get my hands on the early 4 cassette releases!
