Hey guys.

Sorry, it's been a busy couple of weeks. I've been neglecting a few of my interwebz responsibilities to opt for doing some University work and song production instead. I have a track almost finished so keep an eye out for that.

I have nothing worthwhile to report really. Nothing interesting anyway. Well, there's the thing about FLAC ripped using XLD and how it's now WI approvable which is a massive bonus to the audio pirating community as well as the OS X crowd. OH! And I managed to get access to two old drives full of great, high quality MP3 and FLAC! Nah, that wasn't interesting at all, was it?

I promise I'll have something great on here tonight. I have a couple of albums that seriously need exposure. So long & best wishes.

The Sunday Noise #1

Welcome to my first weekly feature, The Sunday Noise. Each week come Sunday evening I'll have a new update fresh with the best in Harsh Noise, Industrial and Power Electronics, ranging from genre classics to brand new releases. I'll be trying to limit this to cassette, rare vinyl and rare CDr, all ripped using quality methods to V0 MP3. It might seem a little unfair to the artist but the way I see it, I'm allowing people to expose themselves to releases sometimes as limited as a 25 cassette run done back in 1996 that would otherwise be completely forgotten, right? It's all for the love of the music! With that said, why not jump right in with a couple of great, great, great pieces of music to launch The Sunday Noise.



Ahlzagailzehguh - Hard To Return

Discogs
Last.fm
MySpace
Official Site
Hospital Productions

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A. Return From (9:24)
B. Return To (9:19)

First we have one of the most limited releases I'm sure I'll have the pleasure of ever posting. Ahlzagailzehguh released Bypassing Time Passing in 2007 to quite a lot of critial acclaim within Noise circles. I'll be honest with you entirely here: while it was good, it has nothing on it's limited edition counterpart. Alongside the original vinyl release came an EXTREMELY limited run of 20 vinyl, each of the 20 including a cassette entitled Hard To Return. Two absolutely abhorrent tracks, each clocking a little under 10 minutes a peice, of the most brain-shattering, droning, aching, monstrously gargantuan horrible Harsh Noise I think I've heard. It's absolutely relentless and probably my favourite Noise release to date. You HAVE to hear this one.

Information on release: Released with Bypassing Time Passing on 20 C20 cassettes. SOLD OUT!




FFH - Nadia

Discogs
Last.fm
MySpace
Official Site
Hospital Productions


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A(1). Waterside (4:59)
A(2). Domino (4:51)
B(1). 3:30 AM (4:23)
B(2). Teufel (3:55)



Nadia is a short but effective affair. Rumbling through both sides of the tape in a little under 20 minutes, this is some mean and sinister ambient-esque noise. While it isn't one of the harder or harsher releases out there it isn't at all without character. Here instead of a raw and enduring collection of horrific sounds, squelches, pops, crackles, fizzes and screams, what you get is buckets of atmosphere. There is, of course, the warmth in fuzzy bass and popping, repetitive beats but it's a more subdued effort. It builds and maleforms from theme to theme, creating a wonferfully dark soundscape that would terrify even the worst of nightdwelling creatures.

Information on release: Limited to 88 hand numbered C20 cassettes. Comes packaged in envelope with 2 inserts. SOLD OUT!



Masonna - Compilation 1987-1992

Discogs
Last.fm
MySpace
Official Site
Coquette



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A. Compilation 1987-1992 (20:56)
B. Live At Bears, Osaka 9.07.92 (13:41)



Lastly, I have another treat for you. This is a long out of print and very hard to find cassette put out in 1992. Side A is a compilation of some Masonna tracks released by Coquette over a period of 5 years on different formats, while Side B is a live recording. While the live recording tires quite easily, the compilation side is some of my favourite Masonna material and it's well worth hearing. Typically horrendous, screaming and thrashing manically over some of the most punishing Noise and Electronics, you can't help but feel Masonna was always destined to be one of the true greats in extreme and avant-garde music.

Information on release: Limited to 50 cassettes put out by Coquette. Probably on C46 tape. SOLD OUT!

CHZZZBRRRAAAAAADUDUDUDUDUDZZZZEEEDDDDddd *POP CRACKLE*

Is there any explanation that's entirely feasible as to why I only ever listen to Harsh Noise and Power Electronics on a Sunday afternoon?

This gives me a great theme for Sundays. Every Sunday I will upload, review and post a Noise cassette or vinyl or CDr. Expect classics, new and old.

I'll keep you posted.

p.s. it is not advised, for the safety of your placement in your parents household, to have sex at volumes loud enough for either parent to hear. Twice.

MONO - "Hymn To The Immortal Wind"

Hymn To The Immortal Wind

Discogs
Last.fm
MySpace
Official Site
Temporary Residence
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1. Ashes In The Snow (11:46)
2. Burial At Sea (10:39)
3. Silent Flight, Sleeping Dawn (6:00)
4. Pure As Snow (Trails of the Winter Storm) (11:26)
5. Follow The Map (3:56)
6. The Battle To Heaven (12:51)
7. Everlasting Light (10:23)



Picking up from 2006's You Are There, Japan's MONO have returned triumphantly with their most massive sounding record to date. This time upping the ante by enlisting the help of the largest chamber orchestra they've used, what we get here is nothing short of magical. Here the songs seem to flow much more seamlessly than their previous album, merging somber tones of reverberated tremolo guitar into gargantuan walls of noise without a sense of it all being disjointed and without it tiring too easily. They've at last found a point in which to quit a theme and transform it into something bigger and better. The music is a lot more focused and it drives much smoother. And with that being said, you can still expect the typical MONO brand of Post-Rock, of course mixed and mastered by musical mastermind and production genius Steve Albini. The only thing that's lacking, again, is the fact that capturing the intensity of their live performance is nigh on impossible and while their latest opus is packed with the cacophonous grandeur you'd expect, it isn't quite a patch on seeing them in the flesh.



8.1/10

Ducktails - "Acres Of Shade"

Acres Of Shade

Discogs
Last.fm
MySpace
Official Site
ARBOR
Purchase (limited to 100. SOLD OUT)

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A. White House With Green Shutters (10:00)
B. Surfs Up (10:15)


Matt Mondanile returns with a brand new tape, leaving behind his previous style of lo-fi bedroom psych-pop. With this release, he's opted for swirling synths and baked out psych-drones, swaying in and out of tune and time, lulling the listener into a great, deep slumber-esque trance. This is definitely something for nighttimes.



7.6/10



Information on release: Cassette released by ARBOR. Limited to 100 C20 tapes with full colour covers and printed labels.

Windy And Carl & Heavy Winged - "Monolith: Earth"

Monolith: Earth

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Last.fm
MySpace
Official Site
Music Fellowship
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1. Windy And Carl - Intelligence In Evoluation (29:00)
2. Heavy Winged - Wool And Water (23:04)
3. Windy And Carl & Heavy Winged - Monolith: Earth (23:45)

"The Monolith series combines two artists on the same one-sided, reverse-cut LP by hard-panning one recording to the right and the other recording to the left. By adjusting the panning controls on his or her turntable, the listener is free to control the degree to which the two recordings melt into one."


What a wonderful, wonderful concept! A single sided picture disc LP showcasing two great bands in collaboration but with a peach of a twist: you get to select the extent of each recording when playing back the entire mix. To put it simply, Windy & Carl are the left speaker, Heavy Winged take the right speaker. You go left, you get all of Windy & Carl. If you go right... well, I won't insult your intelligence.

With the fannying about and playing aside, what does the music really have to offer? You often wonder when it comes to something physically conceptual if the music will ever live up to the hype. In this case, being the great fan of Ambient and Drone that I am, I'm left feeling at least fulfilled. And while it isn't the most satisfyingly brilliant record, it does have it's pros. For starters, the entire Windy & Carl track alone is breathtaking. Reminiscent of one William Basinski, the track bleeds seamlessly from start to finish in a beautiful array of sounds and noises only building to a Drone to the close of the almost half an hour effort.

And again, on it's own, the Heavy Winged track is good. It's abrasive and iratic. It's what you'd expect from a Noise Rock song. The sad thing is that combined, with both tracks panned perfectly left and right, as the collaboration was intended, I'm not so sure. They do add to one another but there's a total lack of a sense of completion within the music. It seems a little bit of a mismatched effort and while I understand that Ambient over Ambient or Noise over Noise would be completely conterproductive, I think that it could have been much, much better.


6.3/10

The Appleseed Cast - "Sagarmatha"

Sagarmatha

Discogs
Last.fm
MySpace
Official Site
The Militia Group
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1. As The Little Things Go (8:15)
2. A Bright Light (7:05)
3. The Road West (8:08)
4. The Summer Before (3:09)
5. One Reminder, An Empty Room (1:49)
6. Raise the Sails (6:27)
7. Like a Locus (Shake Hands with the Dead) (4:02)
8. South Col (6:27)
9. An Army of Fireflies (4:28)

The Appleseed Cast return with their sixth studio album and their first since 2006's "Peregrine". While most of the album remains instrumental, beautifully cascading melody through tremolo guitar and consistent, constant soft tipper tapper percussion not uncommon to the new wave of Post-Rock artists (Explosions In The Sky, Caspian, This Will Destroy You), we also see the clear nods to their Emo routes as well where vocals and conventional song structures are present. Sadly, the vocals are almost scarcely used throughout the entire album. There's also room for the odd climatic eruption resulting in large sounding driven moments but I can't help but feel we've been here before. While it is a good record, it isn't by any means inspirational nor unique. It suffers often of sounding "samey" not from songs within the album but from all of the bands that had done this 5 years previous.

What I can say is that it is a good showcase of well written modern Instrumental Rock that will appeal to most fans of Emo and Post-Rock.



6.7/10

Venetian Snares to release full-length and EP.

Finally, Planet µ Records has updated their site with more conclusive information regarding the new Venetian Snares record and EP. We have track lists for CD (listed here) and for the vinyl releases, which you can find on the links provided.


Filth



Release date: 20th April, 2009

1. Deep Dicking
2. Crashing The Yogurt Truck
3. Labia
4. Mongoloid Alien
5. Chainsaw Fellatio
6. Kimberly Clark
7. Calvin Kleining
8. Kakarookee Hates Me
9. Splooj Guzzlers
10. Pussy Skull



Horsey Noises



Release date: 1st June, 2009

1. Horsey Noises
2. Horsey Vag Island
3. Pig Dync
4. Horsey Noisers



There is a new track from the Filth album on his MySpace. Be sure to check it out 'cause you all know Aaron Funk has a great way with the whacky Breakcore.

Spinning the rumor mill yet again.

Clicky

A new year always comes hand in hand with a brand new rumor regarding our beloved Richard D. James and his many, many "projects". With Steinvord, we're to believe that this is a collaboration between AFX & Squarepusher.

While that might sound a little to good to be true, I'd urge you to check those tunes out. They're fuckin' great!

Oh, and of course there's the news that we're due an AFX album on the 31st of March this year. The details are limited but I'm still skeptical/excited!

Grouper/City Center - "Split 7" "

Split 7"

Discogs
Last.fm (Grouper/City Center)
MySpace (Grouper/City Center)
Official Website (Grouper/City Center)
No Label
Purchase (limited to 500. SOLD OUT)

Download




A. Grouper - False Horizon (4:22)
B. City Center - This Is How We See In The Dark (3:46)

Two new tracks featured here from both Grouper and City Center. On side A we have a Liz Harris continuing everything that was wonderful about Dragging A Dead Deer Up A Hill: haunting vocals, this time layered to greater effect, strumming, reverberated acoustic guitars and sweet, if not awfully morose, melodies. As I've said before, Grouper goes from strength to strength with every release and False Horizon is no exception.

With side B comes a refreshingly dense, dreamy number thick full of distant, beautiful vocals and lovely, reassuring nursery rhyme-esque instrumentation. It's lullaby-ish qualities are a welcome change from the often upsetting nature of Grouper's music. Jingling bells and papery percussion accompany swirling noises of somnambulant rhythm. I love this. I really, really do.

8.4/10



NB I'll be working on contacting City Center to aquire more of their music because it is simply stunning.

Æthenor - "Faking Gold And Murder"

Faking Gold And Murder

Discogs
Last.fm
MySpace
Official Site
VHF Records
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1. I (10:34)
2. II (9:51)
3. III (10:17)
4. IV (5:07)

Avant-Metal trio Stephen O'Malley ( Sunn O))) ), Daniel O’Sullivan ( Guapo ) and Vincent de Roguin ( Shora ) return with their 3rd dose of mindblowing sounds but this time they're joined by legend David Tibet of Current 93, percussionists Nicolas Field and Alex Babel, and guitarist Alexander Tucker. This is arguably Æthenor best release yet. One thing for certain is that this is definitely their heaviest offering. Drawing influence from a myriad of genres, sometimes blistering with the free-jazz style drumming of Babel and Fields then meandering into long, low-end passages of bass, drones, waves and washes of electronics, Rhodes and guitar. The only sense to be seen throughout the whole record is the almost insane chanting vocals of Tibet, sometimes closer to spoken word than song. This is one hell of a weird take on Metal.

"Brooding, primeval, dark, alchemical epics are full of a ferocious intensity, sounding more like a starlit night being ripped open by lightning than a musical group. Intelligent and primal, like a daemonic workshop, battering up Pandemoniums and dreaming of gold and murder, Æthenor are spectacular." -David Tibet

7.1/10

Pocahaunted - "Gold Miner's Daughters"

Gold Miner's Daughters

Discogs
Last.fm
MySpace
Official Site
ExBx Tapes
Purchase (limited to 200. SOLD OUT!)


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(A)1. Hideous (5:40)
(A)2. Sun (8:30)
(B)1. Demon (13:30)

It wouldn't be right to bury the first month of the new year without knowing we've seen a release from California's self-confessed "Olsen twins of blissed out drone”. Just over two years on from the absolutely astonishing debut tape Moccasinging, we're presented with their 26th release and it's quite simply stunning. The three tracks of wonderfully psychedelic drones act as a great canvas for the soaring tribal-esque vocal styles and the quiant stringed instruments being scarcely yet lovingly bowed. Coupling this to great effect comes the occasional percussive hit or tap or rattle accompanied by jangling guitars. And while this might, on paper, come across as something horrible or even nightmarish, I can only assure you that this is nothing short of magical. It's the score to a beautiful rainbow-laden dream of distant, far off places and times.

Two new tracks are features on the A side, while side B has a 15 minute live recording. The only downside to a tape release, of course, is the lack of storage to utilize on such a medium. And while it's a pretty addition to any collectors stack, pile, shelf or cabinet, the music itself only clocks in at a little over 26 minutes, and it leaves you wanting.



7.9/10



Information on release: Cassette released by ExBx Tapes. Limited to 200 C30 tapes.

I'm sorry for the lack of correspondence...

It seems that I have been completely incapacitated by what can only be described as Manflu. And while you may think this isn't anything to whine about, I can firmly assure you that it is, in fact, the worst illness known to the human race.

It's one half Tuberculosis, 3 eighths Bubonic plague & 0.5/4's Pneumonia. It's also what killed Jesus, Martin Luther King, John Lennon, Attila the Hun, Winston Churchill, Christopher Reeve & He-man. History has just been too ignorant to note all of this down.

But, on a lighter note, I have some stellar records waiting to be posted. A lot of new stuff that's came out over the past month and several classic "Hidden Gem" wonders. Basically, a lot of Japambient, Noise, Experimental, Drone, Techno, IDM and the usual nonsense. I'm feeling like a little bit of Screamo, too. Oh, and maybe some more Post-Rock. I will eventually get around to building quite a collection with some easier archiving/listing with links.

Anyhow, thanks & keep reading!

Snow day!

There is literally more snow than I can deal with! In fact, a congregation of Snowpeople in my back garden still seems like a great idea but I'm oddly drawn to the park across from my house. The construction which became part of legend in the last sizable snowfall in '05 was a welcome statue representing all that encapsulates childish fun and boyish charm. The neighbours did, indeed, love our snowperson. However, I'm not sure if building a snowman with a 5 foot phallus is allowed when you're 21? Especially not when you're doing it all on your own...

Either way, I'm sure I'll take the time to snap a few pictures to throw up here. It does look awfully nice down by the farm and over the motorway.