Lesser Dog - Tavistock Anthropocene
Lesser Dog is a new act from last year ( 2021 ). Hailing from Portugal, dealing with the general harshness of life through a sound that lies between power electronics and industrial soundscapes. This album is the first full-length by Lesser Dog, the other 3 releases have been splits with like-minded artists. Both sides of the cassette have been filled up with 7 tracks, almost 60 minutes in total. Released via Danvers State Records as a limited 50 copies cassette release. Love the cassette design by the way!.
The first track Exceptional Creatures lets the listener into a... eerie post-apocalyptic and dreamy soundscape. The sound of rust, decay, and degeneration is quite visceral here. A very experimental thing between fields-records and ambient noise. Sort of takes me back to The Grey Wolves and even early Test Dept when they/he being more in the experimental-soundscape department that is. Love the layering of weird sounds here, lots of stuff for the ears and mind here. Mechanized brutality and nightmarish surrealism! Already sounds like a veteran actor in my ears!
The second track Desperate Dispatch starts as an HNW-inspired piece. But evolves more into a rumbling radio communication in some world war. Again a very brutal piece of nastiness with some interesting atmospheric undertones going on. A very noisy thing, but you sort of listening to it with ambient ears.
The third track Tavistock Anthropocene returns to that kind of hypnotic and metallic early Test Dept-sound. A sample from some documentary/radio, something about the decline of the human race (fewer babies and all that). A great piece of real industrial music, just give it a listen and you will know what I mean! Just love that sound of an old abandoned factory!
We flip the cassette and continue with the B-side. The fourth track is called Decimation Mechanisms. A mechanized nightmare keeping dying bodies alive for too long. The sound of machine guns in the streets awaken the dying patients, while the monstrous machine keeps on working to keep them alive. There is almost a storytelling mood in how these soundscapes work, they work on the listener's imagination... without a doubt!
The fifth track Bio-Hacking sounds like a vortex wall of sound. A hypnotizing cesspool of biological decay. Again, some interesting fields recordings going on here as well. Pulsating, repetitive ambient noise with TONS of layers, dynamics, and reverb! Fxxxxxx love it!
The sixth track T.C.B. jumps right in when the fifth track stops. Mercury and wet metallic sound, death-industrial moods, heavenly evil sound distorted beyond belief!... The classic proto harsh-noise meets industrial in the eighties kind of sound, told you that Lesser Dog sounds like a bloody veteran! Fans of Macronympha and early Contagious Orgasm, take notice!
The seventh (and last track) is called Silhouettes of the Past. A very subtle and rumbling piece of the highly dynamic ambient noise wall. A great outro for the album. I can sense ( and hear ) watery drops and... the sound of a playground ( kids playing ). You can also hear birds and all that. But, there is a sinister tone in this. Like if you are looking at something, and you are thinking about how that place was like... 30+ years ago. And now?. The playground/school has been demolished, your question would be ´did your childhood mean anything?´ Or are you just a brick in a huge puzzle/wall. The past is a thing that haunts you, and it will keep on reminding you of things that you either cherished or hated. I love this piece of atmospheric noise-wall, and I love the way how it ended as well.
Shit. This album is VERY good. With a lot of thought and sincerity attached to it. An atmospheric industrial-soundtrack journey. Not the most pleasant one, but one which will definitely give the listener a kick! It´s early Test Dept meeting it up with the Grey Wolves, but again with a unique sound and perspective. I´m looking forward to hearing more about this act in the future! You cannot hear the thing on some Bandcamp page, so you just have to bloody trust me... and buy the damn thing (bloody link below!)
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