V/A - Schloss Tegal Presents Kollektiv - 

Music from the Sanatorium

We have been around the world of Schloss Tegal once with the great dark-ambient/death-industrial offering Psychometry. This time we´re not solely dealing with Schloss Tegal, but we are dealing with a various-artists compilation released by the act itself. Inspired by such cult compilations as Für Ilsa Koch (Come Organization) and Vhutemas Archetypi (Side-Effect), this comp was first released on tape back in 1982! And this time around it has been re-released in a CD-digipack edition of 300 copies on Tegal Records. 

The theme (or the idea) of the comp itself was to represent the underground post-industrial/experimental/noise scene and how it was distributed on tape via mail, another word: Home-taping mail-art! A lot of obscure names, and some heavyweights. In other words, fantastic obscurity is being re-issued! We need more of those!!!... So let´s dig down and dig the obscurities from the past!

The first track with Seiei Jack called I Can´t Remember This Title already greats the listener what we are actually dealing with. We´re not dealing with the sort who tell themselves that they are gonna do a specific kind of experimental genre/style, either a new Merzbow or a Front 242. It´s freestyled/open-minded stuff with a visionary thought!  The track has a ritual-chanting kind of thing to it, while reminds me of some obscure recording with Buddhist monks. The main difference is that it sounds like it has been recorded in some damp cellar, and not in a temple. A short track that raises curiosity without a doubt! Love the low-fi approach here!

The second track with Lard - Untitled. Has a weird industrial free-jazz thing going on, with a thumping proto-death-industrial rhythm (Megaptera?). Lovely kind of 70s TG feeling going on here, REALLY murky stuff.

The third track Banned Productions with Ornament #2 greats the listener with chopped-up distorted sounds, screaming microphones, and someone banging on something metallic. A bit like early Esplendor Geomtrico and SPK. 

The fourth track is by Jim Jones, informing the listener about someone having.... a Sexual Interest In Me (track title). A lovely piece of obscure recording with the notorious cult leader puts the listener into the right mood! 

The fifth track is also a bit interesting in a truly fxxxxx up way. Euparunia Campaign track called What You Once Were. Includes the warped and distorted sounds of a porn flick with crying babies in the background. Those warped sounds take me back to that strang video, where someone hacked a TV transmission while being dressed up as Max Headroom (Back in the eighties). 

The sixth track by Problemist called Krank (Crazy in German). Being a haunting piece of post-industrial obscurity. Evocative distorted bass being played, strange typing kind of rhythms, chant-like vocals. A bit like early C93 or the Hunting Lodge. 

Maybe Mental offers the seventh track simply called Sorrow. Creaking of old doors, metallic ritualistic clattering from an old abandoned farm, rat-like sounds with a metallic sound to it, sounds of birds being in a cage... and some haunting piano work here as well. Very interesting and mind-bending stuff. Scary track. 

Brutal Temptation by Pink 36 is the eight-track. Bone-narrowing and ear-piercing sounds with voodoo drums. With some interesting stuff going on in the background as well.

The ninth track Cig Sucking Slut by Red Skull. Red Skull like the guy from Marvel? And is Cig a short word for cigarette?. It´s a sick vocal-based track with some distortion on top of it. Think early Whitehouse, Mauthausen Orchestra or Sutcliffe Jugend kind of stuff.

It gets more mellow with the tenth track by John Wiggins track called Anagenic. A fluid-like substance bubbles out of your speakers, while some mesmerizing ambient moods in the background. A very hypnotizing piece! What happens after that, is worth anyone's ears!

The eleventh track Whisper in the Dark by Room 291 has a proto technoid rhythm to it. Still being in the mellow vibe. Early Skinny Puppy kind of stuff here. Technoid rhythms with cinematic soundscapes.

Track number twelve by The Joke Project offers us the Apocalypse. A strange LSD trip with some circus-like keyboard-work. Might just be the weirdest and most crazy piece on here!

The next track is by Schloss Tegal! Called Autopsy the Animal. A lovely kind of harsh Commodore 64´ish keyboard work puts the listener into a trance, while mind-bubbling sound effects lift the listener into higher territory. Evil-sounding stuff from the sanitorium for sure!

Track by Communications Music Company being the fourteenth track, called What Did You Do Today. Mind-numbing electro noise and vocals clattering and thumping until your brain hurts. 

The last track by Minoy is called Three Favorite Friends. Sounds like the basement of the sanitorium itself. Being able to hear the agonized voices and sounds from the patients and the building itself. A very painful and memorable ending if you ask me. 

So where does that leave us? We have been exploring a piece of documental history for the ears and mind only. A tiny glimpse into the obscure history into recorded mail-art. Every track speaks out for itself, and each track on this comp is great. Why? because as a whole the entire comp works 100%. The artists/acts on the comp don't differ much from each other, but each act has its own and very unique way of expressing itself through sound. For me, it was an incredible journey, not one boring moment here... not one!.

Bandcamp (label):

https://schlosstegal.bandcamp.com/

   

 

 

  

    

 

 Kontakt Service - Letters To the Media

When Scandinavian delights meet the finger-licking goodies from the USA, what do you get? If you are lucky, then you´ll probably get something really nice... like a juicy romantic dinner or something. If you are not soo lucky, then you´ll probably end up having to deal with something like Kontakt Service. Two perverts, one from Ideal Father and one who calls himself Mortum ( Stone Wired, Human Vault ). These guys are up to absolutely no good, probably kidnap your pretty daughter and force her to watch European porn flicks from the 70s over a sweet glass of cherry wine. But apart from that, they nonetheless decided to bang their heads together to create a nightmarish death-industrial treat/album. Letters To the Media is their debut, which has been released on Death In Venice as a limited 30 copies cassette. A lovely kind of old-school collage cover design, with a sleazy sort of feel to it. 6 tracks over, 30 minutes plus. 

The first track I´ll Bring You Down introduces low-fi recorded samples from some old documentary about prostitution, this gets mixed up in a howling, surreal, and (again) nightmarish sort of Texas Chainsaw Massacre-soundscape. A churning death-industrial bass sound with some cool heavily distorted vocals is present as well. Kind of slow-moving old-school power electronics with death-industrial elements. 

The second track One Final Night is more simple and minimal in sound. Not that far away from the sound of Brighter Death Now´s Necrose Evangelium. Sort of an icy and foggy sort of feeling going on in here, the sound from the world which exists between the dead and the living. A cold and icy place where dead souls seek the means to end their eternal suffering. A lovely picturesque track indeed! 

I Am What Is Real is the third track on the album, continues that haunting sound which the second track introduced us to. The perfect soundtrack to describe all the murky and foul things that are happening behind closed doors. Lovely nasty sounds mixed all together without any aggression, I love the thing that the listener can easily hear all the sounds going on. Truly horrific death-electronics for the minimalist! 

The fourth track Hate Is the Future. A hazy and harsh space-ambient kind of sound fills the room. My first thought was that it sounded a bit like an evil version of Rymdborg. Not the kind of track/sound you would expect from a track called Hate Is The Future, but it does raise the curiosity of the mind and ears. A very glitchy, dense, and raw ambient piece with a lot to lay your ears to. A get a kind of big city noir feeling here as well.

The fifth track Sell Your Bones, has a sample from a drug addict telling a heart-broken tale about selling her son for her to get drugs. Draggin, crawling, screaming, and distorted sounds with some excellent vocal parts here. Again, Kontakt Service nails that horrific feeling once again. 

The last track Kill-Rape (love the merry titles right?!). I am 100% sure, but I do think that I am hearing a sample from Jeffrey Dahmer. Explaining how he came from a good family (and all that). Some cool and mind-bending sound-effects thumps on like a classic TG song, I really dig those low-fi distorted sounds here! Another excellent track!.

A bloody masterpiece. The only track that I felt was boring was the first track, but the rest of the album nails it right into the eye. Fans of Brighter Death Now, Atrax Morgue, and Intrinsic Action take notice. A harsh ambient-driven death-industrial treat from the good old days. Do not miss this one, there are still some copies left!

Bandcamp (label):

https://deathinveniceproductions.bandcamp.com/album/kontakt-service-letters-to-the-media

        

 BU.D.D.A. - Erste Opfergaben 

A not too old project has just released a new album. BU.D.D.A. is an interesting act, having some veteran members within. One is Chris Sigdell (B°tong and NID) and the other is Sascha Stadlmeir (Owner of the Attenuation Circuit label). An experimental act that travels in the realm of mediative ambient drones. Not that far away from other like-minded spacy stuff like Maeror Tri, Zoviet France, Beequeen, or Troum. This one is their third album, and it has been released as a limited CD-R in a pro digifile on Marbre Negre. 3 tracks, about 37 minutes in total. 

The first track named The Mourning Of The Midnight Diner´s Broken Heart is the longest track, and sort of works as an "intro" for the entire album. It immediately sounds like the work of sound-veterans, like experienced space-cowboys. The track is a breathtaking plunge into another dimension where time simply stands still... completely. Top-quality stuff with tons of depth to it! The track starts with some mysterious guitar strings. The kind of tapping the strings, and then the sound just travels through the room until it vaporizes into the thin air. Cool evocative deep archaic drony sounds can be heard and felt, while some interesting radio voices chatter as well (Astronauts?). Quite evident that we are dealing with a melancholic piece that will suck you into a hole. Later on, lots of other cool sounds are added to the mix but more importantly... the thin red line runs through the entire sound production. Incredible deep stuff, true space ambient!

The second track L´Enfér Des Réves Pérdues  mooves closer to a more sinister sound. I'm thinking... weeping angels or dying whales for some reason. Don´t stare too long into the abyss or the abyss will start staring back at you. This track almost gives me that sensation about... being scared of heights. The track sounds like being... somewhere high... and you dare not to look down! Maybe we are talking about balancing on some high cliff, and if you fall... you fall straight into the bottom of hell itself. An ambient track both containing beautiful angelic and hellish infernal moments! There are some incredible cool spacy sounds to be discovered/heard here!

The third and last track is called Human Dignity Is A Cave sounds like... the laboratory of an alchemist. Something is happening, hidden from sight inside a room. The shuffling of glass-like tools, water dripping from old cellar pipes, and rats behind the walls?. All of these sounds dissolve strangely into the next stage of life itself. Life after death, or the life after death?... I don´t know!. Love the melancholic feeling here as well. Some highly manipulated human voices here, creating chant-like drones through the machinery. Magnificent work here!

An incredible album. Top edge ambient music here for the fans of the more.. drony/spacy-stuff! I cannot stress out enough about the bloody sound quality, which is beyond good. The whole bloody thing engulfs you completely and begs you to listen to the damn bloody thing over and over again. A masterpiece within the realm of modern ambient music!

Bandcamp (band):

https://budda-official.bandcamp.com/

Bandcamp (label):

https://marbrenegre.bandcamp.com/album/erste-opfergaben

 

    

 Herbarium - Of Aconitum

A release from 2021 via Realm of Sleep, physical cassette-copy sadly sold out... but I will review it anyway! 

It´s another one of those interesting side-projects by Jason Browne ( Windersinnen, Boreal Dawn, Shelter Ov Shadows, etc). As you can see on the cover artwork (and the album title), then yes... we are dealing with something of a druidic sort of nature. Herbarium is all about the preservation of herbs and plants (drying them and pressing them). While Of Aconitum is about a certain plant that either can be used as medicine or to create a poison to kill! Also known as Wolfsbane or Queen of Poisons. And yes, the cover artwork has a Wolfsbane on the artwork. And the skull?. Yes, a wolf's skull (made a Google search on that!). For the movie-nerds, the Wolfsbane is also featured in the classic horror-flick Wolfman with Lon Chaney.

There is only 1 track on the album/cassette, the track is on the A-side... the one with the cool sticker on. An almost 20 minutes long piece. And yes, it´s simply called Of Aconitum. 

An old-school proto dungeon-synth lo-fi sound kicks, think a slower early Mortiis or Old Tower. Lovely low-key martial drummings and sorrow-filled and epic organ synth-work, grim and cold stuff... just the way I like it!. The esoteric and archaic feeling is there, and the sense of timelessness is absolutely breathtaking. 

A kind of dungeon synth album that can give the listener a sense of what real dungeon synth is all about, Jason Browne absolutely nails it down on this! Ancient castle ruins in a heathland forgotten in time. This stuff also takes me back to that classic series called Robin of Sherwood, a darker and more occult-driven version of the Robin Hood story. Brilliant! 

There isn't much to tell really, a one-track album that gives the listener a truly epic and mysterious journey into a forgotten realm. This is real dungeon synth at its most serious moment, without drunken dwarfs and silly elves. Go and use 19 minutes of your time on this, you won't regret it! 

Bandcamp (label):

https://realmofsleeprecords.bandcamp.com/album/of-aconitum

 

    

 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!)

Store Envy (Label):

https://danversstate.storenvy.com/products/33230476-lesser-dog-tavistock-anthropocene-c60

Discogs (band):

https://www.discogs.com/artist/9359836-Lesser-Dog

    

   

 

 

   

 Escuadron de la Muerte & Alpha + Galates 

- Himnos Y Resistencia. Veterans Psychotroniques.

Yup. It is one of the longest headline entries on Kalteldur ever. Two acts, one hailing from Mexico and one hailing from France. Putting their thoughts and ideas together, and have managed to pull a kind of split album on CD. One actually 100% split as of such, the two bands (maybe randomly) share the tracklist on the album. 

The one-act from Mexico (Escuadron de la Muerte) is a veteran when it comes to Mexican power electronics. An act that has been active since 2008, and has had its albums released on Steinklang, Skullline, and even had their debut on Trevor Ward´s Strength Through Awareness Branch (Grey Wolves). Be sure to check their discography out, cause it´s massive! The other french act Alpha+Galates is an act that is somehow connected to the industrial ritual act Melek-Tha (which is also a French act!). Several releases by this so-called skinhead-industrial act, some physical releaes are available on some of the links on their Bandcamp site (Link below)... The truth is (which was later told), was the idea behind this track came from Dr. Strangelove!

What else can I tell, the cover art of course!. What do we have? An incredible and surreal rainbow-colored painting, showcasing the kind of dreams that comes out of the mind of filmmaker David Cronenberg. On top of that, you also get a cool-looking poster with it. A kind of nice demonic-themed painting which reminds me of something from one of those Warhammer Fantasy books that meets Hellraiser, which I actually like cause I am a  nerd! You don´t always have to show WW2 photos to be a tough power electronics act. Enough of that, let us get on with the recordings!

The first track is called Conspiracion de la Vodka (with Escuadron de la Muerte). I don´t think it is about doing noise while being drunk on Vodka (Could be). But it could also be about a specific Vodka advertisement which showed a map of 19 Century North America, back then where Mexico was a part of the USA. The whole thing ignited paranoia among the local nativists (which you can understand). The track is a pulsating death-crushing piece of merciless heavy electronics, much in the same vein as Genocide Organ or Death Squad. Heavy and clipped distortions thump like a mad machine while screaming screeching sounds scratch your ear, weird recorded and mutated samples going on the background as well. Cool intro so far, more on the heavy attitude than the aggressive one (which I like). 

The next is with Alpha + Galates and the track is called Psychotronic Holocaust. The track follows up nicely after the first track ended. Rain of noise and metallic clattering with death-industrial aesthetics sucks the listener right in. Cool soundscapes here to contemplate the primitive noise here. 

The third track Operacion Climax de Medianoche with Escuadron, starts with low-fi AM-radio sounds and some moaning female voices. Creepy windy sounds and a thunderous death-industrial-machinegun rhythm kicks in. A lovely subtle and brutal piece, very hypnotizing! 

The Fourth track with Alpha + Galates called Detruire le Monde Moderne sounds like... Some kind of recorded music, being heavily distorted and multilayered with tons of mutated feedback. I sense a kind of epic melody in there, which kind of takes me back to the noisy moments with Blood Axis.  

The fifth track is also with Alpha + Galates called Vers i´Alliance des Forces, which is a track that floats in the same way as the former track, just way more harsh and aggressive. The sound is in the traditional German power-electronics sound.  

The sixth track (Alpha + Galates again) is a bit more interesting. Power electronics with a kind of ritualistic setting. It goes from a heavy sound to a more moody soundtrack sort of sound. Noisy soundscapes clashes with the soundtrack of old black and white horror flicks (sort of). Very intense mood going on here! 

I will now jump to the last track, which is a track where both acts are being present!. A harsh-noise wall with dynamics starts the thing, which extra layered sounds of noise being added while you are listening. A hint or two of sounds behind this wall can be heard and sensed! The wall is then turned down while the sounds behind the wall become easier to hear. Grey´Wolves´ish vocals are added later on as well. The wall is now kind of...looped. Which ends and is repeated in a thumping explosive sound. High pitched sounds yelling the listener that the end is nigh ( or the album ). 

And that ends the album, and yes... some of those high-pitched sounds can still be heard if you ask me. It was a raw and brutal experience without a doubt. Kind of a mixed feeling with the way how the track listing goes, I would rather hear a full-length from each act. I don´t really think that the sound of the two acts sticks all that well together, maybe that was the intention! My favorite of the two acts would be the Mexican ones, their stuff just seems more... thoughtful and...patient as well. While the French cannot wait and jump head-first straight into it (which some are more into, then acts while relays more on mood before action). 

I still think that it is an interesting album which has a lot of good moments. We are also dealing with an album that requires the listener to listen to it again ( a couple of times ). First time I heard this album was different, compared to the second and third times. But on top of that, I do actually have a gut feeling that we are dealing with something which might cult recording turn into a cult album in the future. There is a lot of blood and sweat here kids!. 

Bandcamp (label):

https://marbrenegre.bandcamp.com/album/himnos-y-resistencia-veterans-psychotroniques

Bandcamp (band - Escuadron de la Muerte):

https://escuadrondelamuerte.bandcamp.com/

Bandcamp (band - Alpha + Galates ):

https://alphagalates.bandcamp.com/

 

 Kalteldur top 10 of 2021

2019 was a hectic year, and 2020 was an even more hectic year (which explains the absence of a Kalteldur top 10 of 2020, for which I am sorry)... Nevertheless, here we are in 2021! And you know what?! IF you consider all the various teenage-mutant-corona-viruses creating havoc all around... it has actually been a much better year than the former one. People have had a lot more time with their music, and therefore they have created more for me to review. And "luckily" it has been extremely hard to create a top 10 list because there have been SO MANY GOOD RELEASES! Well... Let us not delay the show, I proudly present for you all The Kalteldur top ten of 2021! 

Number 10:

Jugendwerkhof - Leibenfamie

Low Life High Volume

The relentless aural punishment from this harsh-noise beast was hard to forget. A devastating metallic-grinding post-apocalyptic mess that will swallow you whole, leaving you absolutely drained of mental and physical energy when the album ends. I love the way how they have managed to sneak in the industrial sound into a harsh-noise setting, we could use more of that in the future! 

Number 9

Flow Control - Endless March

Elm Records

Ambient music is easy to make, hard to actually make it really good. Flow Control is a good example of that statement, which I actually think that Brian Eno once said in an interview somewhere. Endless March was... an endless album. The feeling of being completely isolated while the corona thing was going on, with a huge fire ravaging the landscape at the same time. It is a quiet and pleasant album, but with a kind of... silence before the storm which made the album kind of... unnerving in a memorable post-apocalyptic way. A brilliant ambient treat with a good conceptual idea.

Number 8:

The Secrete Society - Thee First Secrete

Marbre Negre

Dark and extreme electronic music is always a guarantee when dealing with such labels as Marbre Negre. Thee First Secrete is absolutely no exception. I even had a rather horrific experience listening to this tape with my Sony Walkman. It was all about a nighttime walk in nature, in a place I didn´t know. A place where the moon was high, and a minor storm was blowing through the trees around me. Well, the thing was that I was lost. So I ended up walking like 2 hours to relocate to my place of origin, which in my case was a summer vacation cottage in the outskirts of Denmark. For 2 hours I listened to this album in a state of growing anxiety, the album contained a certain kind of darkness that you could almost drown yourself into. Pretty gruesome and truly frightening industrial ritual music from your absolute worst Lovecraftian nightmare! As raw and dark as MZ.412 and as surreal and intense as Coil. That album was stuck in my mind for several months after that experience. 

Number 7:

Cities In Ruins - Athanor of Souls

MTRec Distribution

Cities In Runs came with a surprise. A rather deep one if you would ask me. We were all just talking about a mini-album with two tracks and an additional track which was just another version of the first track. The thing which came out of the speaker was truly something worth taking notice of. Engulfing melancholic dark-ambient moods with a kind of post-war´ish sort of setting. Imagine huge buildings being completely devoid of human presence, huge buildings/locations that once have been booming with activity and human life. Chernobyl if I should name a place, among other places as well. Ghosts and memories are all that this tiny album will haunt you with... and it leaves you with a strong impression. I actually think that if you have one of those tape-players that automatically flips the side, you could actually listen to this thing for hours without getting tired of it... it is that good people!

Number 6:

Monosymbiosis - 1

Realm of Sleep

´It was just a colour out of space´. The same thing I thought of when 1 by Monosymbiosis ended. It contained all the elements of the human imagination when considering the vastness of space, equally fascinating and equally frightening! A truly adventurous album with its cold, dismal, adventurous, and vast proto ambient/kraut-rock sound. Could be like traveling through the vastness of the great cosmos, or even through the human body. The whole album is like a pulsating living thing with huge space inside (a bit like the Tardis!). Go out and get it, and explore the worlds within!. 

Number 5:

Parthenfelder - Enduring To the End

Sektion1

In the veins of Anazephalia and Grey Wolves, the project Parthenfelder was something new to my ears. Immensely intense without aggression. Power electronics with a mood-before-action-approach so to speak. Works almost like a religious experience, like some radio channel through which God can speak. Quite epic stuff from the muddy and cold trenches of the first world war. When I had my job as a Corona-test-employee for the state, this tape was living permanently on my Walkman. Perfect for when you have a worldwide pandemic party going on! Best power-electronics release of 2021 here kids!.

Number 4:

Starless - Lezo

Despot

The album is as... mind-boggling as the cover itself. Surreal, free-styled, anarchic almost... sort of a space/room where ANYTHING can and will happen! It sounds like a bloody avant-garde mess when I am trying to describe it... but... there is a thin red line running through the entire recording... leading you through the chaotic schizoid landscape of sound! It is incredibly well achieved, and the electro-acoustic sound quality is absolutely gob-smacking! When the early exploits of the arty avant-garde meet the early industrial sort of. A classic to withstand the time for many years! 

Number 3

En Nihil - Time Destroys Everything

Deathbed Tapes

I must admit that I am a HUGE fan of death industrial. I am so huge fan of death industrial that I must admit that I do think that... too many acts are using that label to describe their music. 90% of the cases you end up with something which just doesn't fit the tag, you either end up with some Genocide Organ-wannabee screaming on top of their lungs or some death-metal band just messing around with electronics. En Nihil was no doubt the real fucking deal, absolutely and 100% true death industrial to the core (almost sounding like a metal dude now). En Nihil is also an act that goes way back to the mid-90s, so it was easy to hear (and experience) that we are dealing with someone being quite experienced in the specific field. Although not as known as either Brighter Death Now or Atrax Morgue, which in my case leaves me to say that En Nihil is an underrated act. Go and seek it out from Deathbed Tapes. 

Number 2:

Sokushinbutsu Project - 即身仏

I heard the entire album on a long bus trip on my Discman. While reading the highly detailed booklet, I entered into a mediative state of mind. I still do when I am hearing this übermensch sort of an album! So what is Sokushinbutsu Project about then?!. It´s not Japanese, it´s from Ithattaly by the way. It´s a concept album that revolves around a certain ritualistic practice done by Buddhist monks. Which in this case is self-mummification! Each track on the album is about the 4 stages which the monk has to endure to reach Nirvana.. which is actually death while meditating!. The difference between the real thing and this album is... you do not die while listening to the album, and this album only takes 50 minutes to get through... while the real deal takes about...3000 days!. A different beast to describe. Partly ritual-industrial with elements of experimental noise here and there, the whole album is completely beyond description. As extreme and otherworldly as the real deal!

Number 1:

Lyke Wake - At The End Of The Dream...

Aseptic Noise

I never thought that Lyke Wake could outdo something as good as the former album Crawling Through The Abyss. Crawling Through also managed to get it the best of 10 in 2018 as number 5. This one actually took my breath away (And my feet). Abysmal synthy stuff, imagine if John Carpenter did a soundtrack for a Argento flick in the 70s! And again, it´s Lyke Wake. He has his own personal style and sound. Creating angelic melodies with esoteric industrial noise on top of it. No one does it better. He even managed to add some deep and ceremoniously female vocal parts on the album as well, which sounds really... incredible gob-smacking. I am so glad that I have been fortunate to hear this incredible album, an absolute masterpiece!  

 

 

 

 Starless - Lezo

Another release from a new label called Despot (see former review, Edward Sol). This one was released as an only-digital album back in May 2020 on Kathacomb, and then later on it was released on Despot in 2021 as a limited cassette release. This release features an act called Starless, and behind this act, we have a Yuri Samson which also has another project called Kadaitcha (which Kalteldur reviewed back in 2019). Whereas Kadaitcha was a murky drone and dark ambient kind-of-a-beast. Starless seems more in the free-styled electro-acoustic/avant-garde-sound. Lezo is the second release/album with this project, the project´s cassette debut was released back in 2013 on Quasi Pop Records. Please note that the release isn´t on Despot´s Bandcamp page (for reasons unknown), but can be listened to/purchased via the Bandcamp site for Khatacomb. 

The first track on the A-side called Entro (think it´s the same as... Intro) starts the track off with interesting free-jazzy clarinets, evocative guitar-work, and pulsating electro-noise.  Couldn´t help thinking about some of the most experimental recordings by Cabaret Voltaire and Controlled Bleeding here. Good to hear that someone uses real instruments once in a while. 

The next track Lezo offers pulsating white and pink noise, distorted old-school sounds (Throbbing Gristle kind of sound), and some mind-bending kind of percussion... plastic tubes? Z´ev fans anyone? Again, in the sort of experimental sound approach so far, sounds very unique and personal. Lovely atmospheric and organic sound, very old-school industrial feel to it (notice the ritualistic vocals here people!). 

The third track with the mysterious title Chudovys´ka brightens your mind and ears with a throbbing sound that sounds like... a tiny smurf/gnome clapping very fast inside your ear! Sounds ridiculous I know, but it actually sounds good. Eerie atmospheric sounds creep in from behind, while a strained and mechanized human being makes creepy sounds in the background. Spooky and distorted doom-trumpets are being present as well! A very nightmarish sort of a track, cannot help thinking of William S. Burroughs Naked Lunch here. So far this album is FULL of surprises!

We flip the cassette and continue with the fourth track called Kvitten´. Still in the area of how dreams actually sound like, if you think about it. How the scenes inside your sleeping mind change like some weird cut-up movie/soundtrack. There are moments on this track that seems gentle, but quickly it changes into something rather horrific/terrifying. A very schizoid track indeed, but a good thing that all the individual recordings stick together (in some twisted way). Again, this album keeps surprising me in a very good way. It´s the art of making a bad trip a good trip going on here!. 

The fifth track on the B-side is called Inshiy. Haunting piano notes and intense evocative moods. The perfect soundtrack for a ghost story here. Love the reversed recordings going on... and that slightly angelic feel going on. Not sure if this is heaven or hell here, or both at the same time. Angels to some, devils to others I guess. The sounds, in the end, mechanized rumblings from some weird machine with ghosts inside... brilliant!. 

The last and sixth track is called Saga. Mysterious Ukrainian spoken words, percussions, and clarinets. An evocative piece that again sounds like something from a movie, imagine a Ukraine film-noir with a hard-boiled detective. He doesn't speak in a tone that his desire is to make people happy, but more in the way of just telling how things REALLY are. Like that hard-boiled detective telling you the secrets of the town of a bottle of bourbon. A very good recording, if Laibach would do something similar like this then I might consider listening to them again! Very very very good!

A 100% brilliant album with all the tracks being good. Highly free-styled and experimental, but with a clear conceptual focus. The sound is incredibly good and well-recorded... you can almost taste the sounds in the mouth at times! The whole album sticks together like glue, but at the same time... each track is an independent piece in itself. Tons of reasons for you to check this album! For fans of Throbbing Gristle, Controlled Bleeding, and Laibach.

Bandcamp (Label):

https://khatacomb.bandcamp.com/album/lezo

Discogs (band):

https://www.discogs.com/artist/6022985-Starless-6

 

       

 

 Edward Sol - Almost Sugar

This time we are not dealing with either a new artist or a new side-project! This time we are dealing with someone who has been active for over 10 years. On top of that, he is also one of the leading key figures in the experimental industrial scene of Ukraine. A highly productive fellow he is. This tape is one of the newest which has been released by a new label called Despot. Limited to 30 copies! 2 tracks being 15 minutes long. 

The first track called Almost Sugar enters an almost clinical laboratory, the kind of place where modern alchemists work. The sound of hot bubbling liquid inside tubes, distorted synthy-drones, mechanical but organic sounds, and tiny metal balls rolling inside...something. As you can hear, a kind of track that not only opens your ears but your mind as well. 

Later on (in the background), we also have some haunting psychedelic sound of human voices forming words...highly mutated being beyond recognition. Also being present at this time, the sound of insect wings and pleasant high-pitched tones will completely hypnotize you!  A brilliant track offering a lot of styles in sound. It´s completely packed with different warped microscopic sounds (which you might subconsciously recognize!). 

The second track called Superdry People actually sounds like... something that sucks you dry? Imagine being kidnapped by aliens and having over 100 tubes on your arms and legs, sucking away the very stuff which keeps your mind alive. The whole thing (in the beginning), sounds... well dry! With a very eerie kind of... the sound of suction. I guess this is how it sounds when Lovecraft´s Colour Out of Space sounds like when it sucks dry the farm of Ammi Pierce, creating that blasted heath. A very alien-sounding experimental track, the kind of stuff that sticks into your ears and mind. Again, lots of adventurous stuff happening in just 15 minutes! My favorite moment is when the distorted/warped sound of fireworks goes on... brilliant!

What can I say? A mind-blowing album! A soundscape that keeps the listener more... curious. The sort of soundscape you want to escape into and explore... like some hidden world hidden from sight. Edward Sol has managed to create an album that pushes the boundaries and at the same time has kept a brilliant focus on where he wanted this album/sound to go. Just like space-traveling, Almost Like Sugar is... Brilliant Like Sugar!. 

Bandcamp (band):

https://edwardsol.bandcamp.com/album/almost-sugar

Bandcamp (label):

https://despotism.bandcamp.com/