PÁLL PARKER

Welcome to a 22+ minute mindfuck courtesy of Iceland's Páll Parker. Buried beats, gross manipulations, and an overall presentation that will have you wondering if there's something a bit off with your download interface wiring harness capacitor because things just aren't supposed to sound this weird, you dig? It starts to really (really) get fukkd around the 15 minutes mark - the beats build in presence and intensity and trigger staccato washes of white noise, panic inducing sounds I can only compare to dreams of drowning...dreams that start to feel like reality as To Smear The Sexual Organs begins a cool down/breather before the finale that dissolves into just that erratic beat pulsating as though your life is skipping. And who is say that it isn't......?

TO SMEAR THE SEXUAL ORGANS

ASASIN PARANOIC

This shit. All day long....and hopefully all night. Primitive bedroom electronic/industrial brilliance, there must be legions of these acts releasing tapes in sub-dozen runs that will just languish until inevitable obscurity. There are so many of them. It's impossible to think one could find them all, so we enjoy what we can get our hands on. Fire In The Sky is a three part opus - a murky and relatively mellow wash shielding erratic beats and awkward sounds from direct engagement. Things really get rolling around the six minute mark of Part II, but by then (if you've been listening properly) you'll be in a haze anyway. Folks from Nostilevo, SIOBHAN, LFA (in case that stuff matters to you). Shit is real ill, enjoy.

FIRE IN THE SKY

IS THE BIBLE REALLY THE WORD OF GOD?

Live recordings and outtakes from the brilliant and prolific FRKSE, this time in collaboration with heretofore unknown (to me) KHLYST [K AHLAN]. Oppressive pulsations, manipulated reverberations, sounds that swallow you completely. It's been a pretty swell couple of months, and I've enjoyed the vacation. I wish I could say that I'm happy to be back, but answers to unknowns can only come with time and reflection...if they come at all. But some things I know today and always, and with absolute certainty: Volume is your trusted ally. 

FRKSE // KHLYST

This was released in a criminally small run (thank you, noise scene, for always remaining elitist, mysterious and weird) of less than 25, seven of which were packaged in the shockingly appropriate Tract Society book you see pictured above: 

"Dedicated To The Cause Of Truth, Which Honest-Hearted Persons In All Lands Seek To Know."

ENEMA SYRINGE

You might not want to trust me, and I understand that. Sometimes I steer you wrong, like the time I posted the interview with my father-in-law talking about heat stroke and hydrating enemas. Sorry. But surely you are by now smart enough to trust Chondritic Sound, yes? Good. They were nice enough last fall to repurpose two older recordings by ENEMA SYRINGE and present them with two short new pieces to create Flapper. It was a good move. Lo-fi disjointed repetition, minimal beats, and polite distortion make up the initial track, and then things slowly get darker and more chaotic. It's like a journey and an escape, all in just under twenty minutes.

FLAPPER

KNÆKKEDE STEMMER

A foreboding collection of sounds from Danish aural collagist KNÆKKEDE STEMMER. Subdued industrial ominousity reduced to its most primitive form. The next thirty minutes of your life will be quiet, even temporarily peaceful, but there is nothing calm or reassuring about this release.

BETYNGET AF...

LIFE DRAG

People try really hard to be this weird. This dark. This pure. This real. But Minnesota's LIFE DRAG aren't trying.....they are just trying to be. Morose and monotone noise rock dissected and dismantled, dragged back to its most primitive and sinister state. Get loose. Let go. 

FEEL YOUR GRAVE

OIL THIEF

OIL THIEF are dark and anxious, migrating from sputtering ambiance thunderous demented beats with a calculated precision, descending into disorienting mechanical psychedelia at will. Two tracks here, sixteen minutes of bliss. 

THE FIGMENT // UNDESIRE

TRAAG

Weirdo manipulation and amalgamations of sound that bridge worlds of psychedelic industrial and drug induced soundscapes. Yeah....Nostilevo rarely disappoints, but 2013's Surface World is one of their best releases to date. The year is almost over...stay weird. 

SURFACE WORLD

MUTWAWA

Gorgeous pounding EDM in the most primal sense. This is Midwest after hours dance clubs circa 1988, but seemingly with more drugs...and it's great.

MUTWAWA

CUNTROACHES

THIS. Complete overload, complete mania. Total aural blitzkrieg. Noisier than your band, and more fukkn guts than just about anyone can muster, even in their wildest dreams. After the churning brain melt of "Scum Parole," to roll right into the drum beat (so simple, so out of place, so perfect) that starts "Hard Stool," and then to just torture the shit out of that beat with low end and feedback before descending into relentless and monotonous bursts of chaos. Ugh. This Berlin trio is every kind of awesome. More please - NOW!

CUNTROACHES

Also, the bass player is named Suckles.

MUDO AUXILIO

There are things that I understand, and there things that I just enjoy. And then there are the things that are outside of my field of knowledge, but that I like enough that I want to understand....things like MUDO AUXILIO. Five bleak, quasi-industrial synth dirges that sound more terrified than terrifying and hold my interest completely. The murky pulse of "Avarice" that closes this release is worth the price of admission on its own, but the totality here demands to be consumed as a unit. Repeat listens recommended. 

REVENANT

JS AURELIS

Sit down. Breath deep. Look inward. Get weird. 

This is a world that is mysterious to most (myself included). You want to ask (yourself? someone? anyone? and expert? the authorities? The Artsit?) what is happening. what is the motivation. what do you want from me. WHY....why do I keep returning? But I return. To sounds of digital collisions and audio manipulation. And I don't leave...because I can't. And I don't want to leave - (headphones recommended) -  I want to return.

SLIME OF THE CHASM

SCHIZOPHASIA

True freeks turning punk sounds into mangled space-fi noise. In the world of demented noise punk and people trying so hard to be noisier and more chaotic and more distorted than everyone else, Ottawa's SCHIZOPHASIA are so very far out there that comparisons are useless. Bypassing virtually all of the punk this time around and embracing noise and aural hallucinations with equal vigor, 5000 is on another plane entirely, and serves as a perhaps predictable progression from previous releases (all recommended). Antiracist anarcho/industrial/mutant/NOISE. Indescribably weird...

5000

BLOOMER

Pure and complete damage. Slow motion and excruciating. Industrial carnage, analog distortion and waves of manic sound, all carefully constructed, layers and presented for your discomfort. This 2010 release is an extremely harsh toke. 

BOLO

DRMCRSHR

"Nihilist Queer Revolt Musik" - Hard to express what a mindfuck the DREAMCRUSHER set in New York was. Noise. Blinding noise in a pitch black room with a piercing strobe pointed directly at the (small) audience. Everything was in slow motion, and I was disoriented before the beats started....and then it started. That shrill daemon that had punctuated our show with insane outbursts and generally bizarre behavior all night....now it had a microphone, and now it had control. First there was the spectacle, and then it was enteractive....and I spell that with an "e" because The Entity I Will Call: DRMCRSHR was in your fukkn shit before you knew what was happening. One minute there was screaming in your face, then the lights went off and before you could see again there were two men rolling on the floor in a passionate embrace. I have, perhaps, never been that fukkd by a live performance. Reality and imagination were interchangeable, and it was as if, in between the rapid fire blinks of those lights, anything was possible. The sounds are relentless hi NRG techno/acid house distorted beyond anything approaching reasonable, and even out of the context of the live experience I highly recommend DRMCRSHR. But.....in the flesh. So much flesh. Listening to this tape as I type, I'm reminded how off balance I was when things returned to normal...the lights came up and sense of surroundings slowly returned - but those of us in that room went somewhere. If you're reading this, DRMCRSHR: you fukkn did it. Don't stop. 

HACKERS ALL OF THEM HACKERS

Oh yeah...OF COURSE the motherfukkr is originally from Kansas...

CORUM

When I initially came across this outfit (group? band? artist/s? collective?), I was entranced....and I've only grown to love them even more with each release and incarnation that I devour. Hypnotic missives that travel effortlessly between minimal neu:industrial and tribal rituals, and it all sounds as if it could have been constructed from field recordings. Without full attention, it's easy for these sounds to slip into the background and just provide a subtle soundtrack for your day...and that's fine. But with proper volume and attention, I dare say that you will emerge on the other side of these sixty two minutes a different person. Rubbing your eyes and squinting as if there was something physical, and not spiritual, that you could do to make sense of the journey you just completed. Sometimes the only thing to do is take the trip again, children. 

TALES FROM THE VISION PIT

LOWEBRAU

When I reach blindly for a new electronic artist, this is exactly what I hope I will grasp onto. Mental dancefloor punishment from a Quebec outfit that knows exactly how to find a groove and drive it right into the dirt and then resurrect it in the most glorious manner imaginable. This is '80 Acid House and Detroit Techno crashing headfirst into those new kids flying the EBM banner and then just when you aren't paying attention you're neck deep in industrial brutality. This shit is so goddamn good I don't really know what to say aside from-----listen to these sounds. And check LOWEBRAU, because ">" is just the tip of the iceberg.

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CAESIUM MINE

Tapes like this are why I buy things on a whim. A hunch. A gamble, if you will. Saw a band a few months ago, it was pretty cool. The band did a good job, file under "not really my thing," but they were totally good, if you get my drift.  Perusing their wares post set, I came across this two track cassette and I thought it looked....interesting. Found out it was a solo thing from one of the fellows in the band I had just seen, electronic and noisy....so I parted with five of my dollars and slipped a copy of Alia's Fine into my bag with the rest of my booty. This tape is not good, this tape does not "get the job done." This tape fukkn sucks you in and becomes one with your very being. One the one hand, it's so simple: primitive analog (sounding) synths, exceptionally chilled out beats (on one track), both masked by a soothing cloud of distortion and noise. I mean...that's it, so any fool could do this....right? I welcome all fools to try, and I hope you succeed like this, because this one is a total fukkn success. 

ALIA'S FINE

TIMEGHOST

TIMEGHOST either casually dropped an homage to primitive analog noise compositions, or managed to harness the originality of artists like IVO MALEC and JOHN PFEIFFER...blips, monologues, whirs, digital oddities, found sounds. From the subtle beats in "Delicate Resonances" to the gnome-esque murmurings that weave in and out of the electronics on "On Airs, Waters & Places," Cellular is a dark and deliberate offering. Released in 2014 by Load on wax and Chondritic Sound on cassette...this one is not so much a listen, but a journey.

CELLULAR