Experimental, Noise, Industrial, Dark, Death, Doom, Abstract, Black, Metal; Paperback Magazine (A5 format) - New
Noise Receptor Journal continues its adventures into the physical world, where this print venture constitutes the physical manifestation of the Noise Receptor blog, but also contains interview and art content to differentiate it from the already published web-based reviews. CONTENT Long-form interviews with: Moral Order, Post Scriptvm & Total Black & Nordvargr (30+ year/career spanning interview). Detailed report / photos of the Dominion of Flesh: 5 Years of Cloister Recordings festival. Reviews: 50+ detailed reviews (ambient/ industrial/ experimental / power electronics etc.). Artwork: Original cover artwork + review section artwork by Nordvargr.
Electronic, Experimental, Musique Concrete, Contemporary, Classical, Melbourne, Netherlands; CD - Ex Used condition
Continuity 3 (2002) for percussion and computer uses transformations both of performing technique and of the sound itself to explore relationships between continuous and discontinuous textures and structures. The use of only three metallic sound-sources does indeed create a sense of continuity and coherence, whose converse is to be found in the constantly changing electronic refractions to which the sounds are subjected. The overall effect is of an extension of the idea of resonance, so that as the metallic bodies are struck and resonate, they in turn serve to "excite" the virtual resonating body in the computer, one which is no longer tied to rigid physical objects and natural decays. Both in its adherence to a carefully selected vocabulary of sounds produced by bodies in motion and in its sense of dramatic timing, Continuity 3 seems to continue the musique concrète tradition exemplified most memorably in the work of composers like Pierre Henry, Bernard Parmegiani, and François Bayle. The fact that it is performed in real time by a percussionist and a computer running Max/MSP is a measure of how profoundly the practice of electronic music has changed as a result of the accelerating development of digital technology. At the same time, the lessons it draws from musique concrète, a music composed with magnetic tape and razor blades, is witness to the fact that the best of that music was in no way restricted by what we can now view as rudimentary and fearsomely time-consuming methods, but has, and will no doubt continue to have, many subtle and sophisticated things to tell us about the art of sound-composition. The percussionist Timothy Phillips plays with and against the distorted images of his own sounds as if engaged in the almost subliminal interactions of chamber music.
Electronic, Noise, Harsh, Experimental, Industrial, Hospital Productions; Limited Edition Vinyl LP - Ex Used condition
The 2008 (Hospital Productions) debut full length LP from Brooklyn's Yellow Tears. Yellow Tears features members of Halflings and provides a diverse industrial noise collage. Painful and reflective abuse covers the hands, the face. With a wide hole, guitars, junk, and electricity are swallowed and slurped up with gargling enthusiasm. Compositions raise questions and provide little of answers - short tracks slide through, under and between. Inventive and bizarre while following the tradition of perverse industrial fetishism.
Black Metal, Documentary, Pagan, Mayhem, Burzum, Darkthrone, Norway; Limited Edition 2 x DVD set (2010) - New
There has been more written in books/magazines and visually documented on film about the rise of black metal in the late '80s/early '90s than most would care to shake a stick at, much less a scythe. And almost all of it revolves around the infamous series of events that coincided with the rise of blasphemous form in Norway during the early '90s, including the anti-Christian/pro-Pagan rash of church burnings and MAYHEM's macabre carnival of murder and suicide. The difference with "Until the Light Takes Us" is that it serves at once as a history lesson, cultural treatise, and artistic statement during its 93 minutes, doing so without losing the viewer in a haze of minutiae or purposeless sensationalism. It also pays off by allowing people like Fenriz (DARKTHRONE) to offer an insightful view into the historical/musical side and the ever-controversial Varg Vikernes (BURZUM) to offer a lucid, downright logical explanation of the cultural, heritage-based appeal of the subgenre without spiraling into rants of an overtly National Socialist nature. A range of other scene stalwarts, such as IMMORTAL's Demonaz and Abbath and the ubiquitous Jan Axel "Hellhammer" Blomberg (ex-MAYHEM, et al), discuss their views of the personalities involved and the gruesome fates that befell people like Euronymous and Dead, as well as the artistically significant strides made in a Scandinavian region that gave birth to seminal acts like BATHORY, MAYHEM, IMMORTAL, SATYRICON, DARKTHRONE, ULVER, and BURZUM.
The limited two-disc DVD edition of "Until the Light Takes Us" offers the best bang for the BM junkie's buck. Included across both discs are outtakes, deleted scenes, and visits with several black metal musicians not featured in the film, including Ted "Nocturno Culto" Skjellum (DARKTHRONE) and Jon Necrobutcher (MAYHEM) and additional conversations with the movie's "stars." The 45-minute class on the history of black metal taught by Professor Fenriz on Disc 2 is the cake taker. It is difficult to make a DVD that reinvents the story of the Norwegian metal movement and "Until the Light Takes Us" doesn't do it either, but it sure as hell tells the tale from some different angles in a way that makes it a sweepingly gratifying film experience and a mandatory purchase for the curious and the devoted.
Tasmania, Noise Rock, Shoegaze, Classic, Indie, Unstable Ape; CD (1998) - Ex Used condition
Beacon of Hope is noise rock for sure – something like a cross between crazy shoegaze with mad industrial rock. And the entire album sounds as heavy storm weather arranged for angry vocals and furious guitars. If you want to know what kind of music may come out of the musical hell of 90's Tasmania, then Sea Scouts are your band. Their sound is never too little and almost always too much.
Scientists, Various Artists, Monomen, Philisteins, Mudhoney, Sunset Strip, Cheater Slicks, Rock n Roll, Punk, Australian; CD Compilation, Dog Meat Records (1993) CD
TRACKLIST
-Cheater Slicks Set It On Fire 3:13
–Honeymoon Killers* Murderess In A Purple Dress 2:15
–Monomen* Swampland 4:39
–Stump Wizards* Bet Ya Lyin' 2:12
–Star Spangled Banana Frantic Romantic 3:12
–Walkingseeds* Nitro 3:38
–Mudhoney We Had Love 4:40
–Sugar Shack (2) Hell Beach 1:38
–Vertigo (12) Pissed On Another Planet 3:16
–Philisteins* Teenage Dreamer 2:39
–Laughing Hyenas Solid Gold Hell 3:36
–The Sunset Strip It Must Be Nice 4:19
Experimental, Electronic, Ambient, Noise, Industrial, Abstract; Vinyl LP (2016) - Ex Used Condition
Love Means Taking Action separates itself from Croatian Amor’s previous work because of its ability to maintain an overall mood among its many smaller shifts. Older works like Genitalia Garden would constantly reset tone between tracks, choosing between a darker or lighter sound. Whereas here a song like “No Sex Club” starts so claustrophobically with single-tone electronics and cut up samples of someone panting, only to give way to bright, piano-like chords that shift the whole tenor of the song, while still keeping the original creeping sensation present in the background. These production changes point toward the greater risks Rahbek is taking here. The vocal slicing and splicing on “Like Angel” are reminiscent of Holly Herndon, and the short piano piece “Nadim Call Emergence II” would never exist on previous releases. Here they not only make sense, but give the more traditional Croatian Amor compositions (“Octopus Web,” “Any Life You Want”) more gravity.
Techno, Dark, Electronic, Experimental, Ambient, Germany, Self-released; Double Vinyl LP - Cover has water damage/creases - Vinyl Ex Used condition
Pearl black techno from the shady edges of a decayed forest, Headless Horseman's music doesn't let the light filter through its dead branches slowly waving to an eternal cold breeze. Unstoppable asymetric rhythms support distant industrial recollections and dark shamanic atmospheres from a faded mechanical era, emerging as a carved up figure, half-machine and half-human. This album is the perfect companion to those who seek sunless territories, roamed by murky stampedes of lifeless horseriders.
Experimental, Electronic, Abstract, Tech, Dub, Shapednoise, Mumgo, Logos; Vinyl EP - Ex Used condition
The Sprawl - a scindicate of mutant sound carriers individually known as Logos, Mumdance and Shapednoise. Inspired by Gibson's notions of uploaded consciousness in a post-human society, and the way in which the sensory-scrambling effects of technology have played out across our collective reverie, EP1ventures four cuts of retina-scorching dis-torsion and chrome-burning modular synth work.
Jarboe, Swans, Justin K Broderick, Godflesh, Experimental, Electronic, Industrial; CD (promo copy - no back CD card)
Two of the most prolific, restlessly creative, and influential artists in underground music join forces; the result sounds closest to Jarboe's dark, gothic electronics. Sonically, J2 sounds most like the terrain Jarboe has been exploring as a solo artist: dark electronica, laced, bound, and gagged with goth, psychedelia, and metal. Yet the seeds of this album were planted during the Jarboe-sung "Storm Comin'" from Jesu's recent Lifeline EP-- a dance-y, swirly, poppy track, perhaps even recorded during the same session as these. J2 opener "Decay" begins with eerie, heavily effected Jarboe yodels with a spooky synth-bass churning underneath. Then you get blasted with that thunderous distorted bass-- also an echo of sorts, showing how Broadrick's grit-doom bass from the first few industrial-based Godflesh albums owed a ton (operative word meaning heavy) to the Swans' early nightmare stomps.
Experimental, Electronic, Noise, Australian, Bedroom Community, Rare; Vinyl LP - Ex Used condition
From the ominous darkness and intensity of its opening moments, one might expect a death metal album to break out in an instant, but Theory of Machines is an album whose design is as symphonic as it is confrontational - the tempo doesn’t pick up, no hooks or vocals arrives, and when the drums finally kick in they are as fragmented and corroded as they could possibly be and still resemble a groove.
In Theory of Machines, Ben Frostexploits every extreme of pitch, volume and timbre, the changes in music sometimes seem as gradual as changes in the weather - and sometimes as violent. As the music changes it changes only in textures, colour and intensity so that the sense is not of something being created, altered or even developed, but of something already present being slowly illuminated.
Electronic, Dark Ambient, Limited Edition, Industrial, Experimental; Limited Edition Double Vinyl LP - Ex Used condition
OAKE's music is easily placed on the experimental axis formed by Downwards and Blackest Ever Black.The Berlin duo's music proceeds with the same funereal elegance as Raime's and, like Kerridge, who collaborates with OAKE's Eric Goldstein as UF, it swarms with plunging basslines born at a point where jungle, dubstep and drone collide. But OAKE are nonetheless a distinctive presence. Auferstehung ("resurrection") often sounds like a contemporary classical ensemble scraping and thwacking its way through a score.
