A Token of My Extreme: 2011 Halloween Edition

Normally my 10/31 tunes are a lot more kitschy--Cramps, Misfits, Screamin' Jay etc. etc.--but this year my sights are set on complete skullfucking terror, something more Lovecraft than Roger Corman, and so I dug up some perfect sonic hellscapes to match. Figured I'd share:

1. "Sacred Rites of the Left Hand Path" by John Zorn
2. "Rosemary's Baby" by Fantomas
3. "Nature's Revenge [B-Sides Collect version]" by Skinny Puppy
4. "Napalm (Terminal Patient)" by SPK
5. "Hamburger Lady" by Throbbing Gristle
6. "Rattlesnake Shake" by Wolf Eyes
7. "A Hanging" by Swans
8. "Even The Saints Knew Their Hour of Failure and Loss" by The Body
9. "Bathory Erzsebet" by Sunn O))))
10. "Origin of Supernatural Probabilities" by Tangerine Dream
11. "Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima" by Krysztof Penderekci
12. "I Live to See You Smile" by Today Is The Day
13. "My Heaven [Silent Hill OST]" by Akira Yamaoka

A little on the short side, but if blasting this on repeat won't make trick-or-treaters skip your block I don't know what will.

Sleep tight!

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: Zac Bentz on Field Recordings From The Edge of Hell

I got a chance to interview Zac Bentz, the mastermind behind Xero Music/Dirty Knobs' eight-hour dark ambient opus Field Recordings From The Edge of Hell. A prolific musician, graphic designer and writer for a veritable horde of online publications, Zac remains one of the most interesting artistic personalities I've come across and we are greatly honored to feature his thoughts on the aforementioned album and career.

A big thanks to CJ also for making this all possible.

-SJ

~

Recently I had the distinct pleasure of knocking back all eight hours of Field Recordings in one day. Prior to that I think the longest track I'd ever heard was either "Dopesmoker" by Sleep or the first Disintegration Loops album. What gave you the ambition to make an album this long, was there a sense of one-upmanship involved, and how did you develop the concept?

ZB: Well, I wasn't trying to break any records or top anyone else. I started looking into these hyper-extended songs when I heard some super slowed-down versions of pop songs. Like people taking a Justin Bieber song and slowing it down by eight or ten times. That's how I found out about this tiny little program called Paul's Extreme Sound Stretch. Basically people were just taking the original track, running through the program and posting the results. It would turn these ordinary songs into massive, ethereal dirges. It didn't always seem to work all the well, but it did have some interesting results.

So I figured if it can make Bieber sound, you know, interesting, what would happen if you wrote songs specifically with this extreme length in mind? I did a lot of experimenting and it just took off from there.

Have you gotten any complaints about the length, and do you care?

ZB: No, actually I don't think I've seen any negative reviews. I guess people just don't have the time to be bothered with it if they don't like it. I already know it's not for everyone, that's sort of the point. So no, I wouldn't be surprised if someone didn't like it. To be honest I'm still surprised that it's found such an appreciative audience. The reaction has been nothing short of stunning.

How long have you been making music?

ZB: I first started around 1993 when I was still in high-school. I was a drummer in a normal rock band (and have been ever since then). We rehearsed in the basement at my house. At night I'd start hooking things together and recording my own music. Really primitive stuff. Just basically loops and industrial noises recorded with a 4-track cassette machine. I was deep into Nine Inch Nails, Ministry and Skinny Puppy at the time. Through the years it evolved into more listener-friendly techno (I was a house and trance DJ from around '95 to 2002) and then back into more experimental glitch territory. For the past few years I've been writing music for my new-wave/electro-rock band The Surfactants.

For an album that is conceptually about Hell, there's a lot of natural beauty and subtlety in the sounds you've made that I wouldn't have expected. What do you picture in your mind when you're coming up with this?

ZB: It's interesting...a lot of the concept didn't really come into the picture until I started naming the tracks. I knew it was dark, that's what I wanted, but it wasn't until I started listening to the tracks over and over that the images of this sort of scientific expedition into Hell started to form. I tried to get my own visions across as best I could in the titles without going overboard. I think that's what makes the album so attractive to people, that it's almost completely open to individual interpretation. I always get the most inspiration out of music that's open ended like that, stuff that isn't just about the person making it, you know? So I wanted this to be almost impressionistic. Just enough color and shade to let people's minds wander into their own dark places.

I'm in awe of some of the tones and textures you get here--especially in "Falling Upon the Darkened Shore" and "The Monks' Infinite Machine." What instrumentation do you use and how did you tweak it for such monumental results?

ZB: In a way, the songs are written two or three times. First I'll just write a "normal" version of the song that's anywhere from two to six minutes or whatever. I mostly use just one synth, a small Nord Rack. Some of the songs were actually older things I never finished. I dusted them off and got them back into shape, adding, subtracting and rearranging stuff. So those had some sounds from this giant Roland XP-80 I still use as a sequencer and some other more messed up and effected sounds from who knows where.

So that's the first pass. Then I'd work on stretching them out and that would be a much longer process of trial and error. Paul's Extreme Sound Stretch does weird, unpredictable things and when you're working with a dozen or so 50 minute tracks things get complicated quickly. So I'd just have to immerse myself in this wall of sound, picking out things that were working (whatever that means) and things that weren't. A lot of the time I'd have to go all the way back and re-record parts to get the right sound in the end. Mostly I did a lot of sitting in a dark room making the windows rattle...

It's interesting to hear songwriting done in a macro sort of way--lots of tiny variations, subtle shifts until you realize the track's mood has completely changed by the end. This is clearly more than just drone. Did you employ this same method on shorter works before making something this ambitious?

ZB: I don't think I've ever done any sort of pure drone before. Maybe one or two songs. I have another album available called Shobute that's more glitch oriented. (I've got a ton or older music but it's probably best kept in a well hidden box.) It's the same idea in a way but in a micro direction. I guess I see the similarity, it's just micro taken to marco lengths. Stretching the tracks out reveals all this subtle stuff you'd normally miss. For me it's about the feel and environment that the song inhabits. I guess I often think of songs in a visual way. Nothing specific or like synesthesia, but I can almost envision a scene or a mood that the songs would be the soundtrack for, so I try and work out that feeling through the overall sound.

Do you listen to a lot of other drone/doom/dark ambient artists? Any faves?

ZB: Merzbow is easily my favorite, though I can't say that I listen to his stuff very often! I did go though a phase where he was all I listened to, but I think I got that out of my system. I also really like Pan Sonic. Actually, those two did a live show together that was really incredible so i guess that was a pretty big influence. I also love the early ambient stuff Aphex Twin did. Selected Ambient Works Vol.2 is easily a top album of mine. Back when I was a college radio DJ I would do one night a month that was all ambient. The mid to late '90s were a great time for electro ambient albums. As a kid I remember falling asleep to Hearts of Space on the radio. But I'm not a drone or ambient expert by any means.

Have you gotten any interest from Southern Lord or any of the other big names yet?

ZB: Ha, no. But it's not for a lack of trying! I've sent an embarrassing number of emails out. I have gotten a ton of great reviews though, with writer Warren Ellis being an early champion of the album. The reaction from his fans was overwhelming. I also recently did a remix of cellist Zoe Keating's track "Escape Artist." It was basically just a fan-boy thing I did, but it turned out that she really loved it. She tweeted about it a few times (she's got 1.3 million followers) so that was nice! It's now available as a free download.

I think most record labels and more traditional media just don't know what do with an eight hour album. It's almost impossible to release in physical form (though I have mulled it over) and most of the bigger media outlets have better things to do than devote space to reviewing some crazy, monolithic monstrosity. But really that's fine. Like I said, the reaction I HAVE gotten is from people really devoted to the music and new ideas and who, for lack of a better term, GET it. That's not something you'll find in most main-stream outlets anyway.

Any upcoming projects?

ZB: Right now I'm just trying to get the new album from The Surfactants done. It's a bit like herding cats since we're spread out over two states. But that's what computers are for, I guess. I'm already working on more Dirty Knobs tracks in the same vein as Field Recordings, but I don't want to just repeat myself so it'll probably take a while to figure that out, though there's a lot of ideas bubbling away already. I also have an electro-pop project and something much more harsh in the works, but those are mostly still just on paper and in my head. I figure I have enough ideas to keep me going for at least nine or ten years...

Thank you for your time, and for an incredible album. Best $5 I've ever spent.

ZB: Thank you very much for the support!

~

LINKS:

http://zacbentz.bandcamp.com/album/field-recordings-from-the-edge-of-hell
http://www.warrenellis.com/?p=11908
http://zacbentz.bandcamp.com/album/zoe-keating-escape-artist-dirty-knobs-remix
http://music.zoekeating.com/
http://thesurfactants.bandcamp.com/

A Token of My Extreme: Dälek- Absence (2004)

Ipecac Recordings; September 7, 2004
http://www.deadverse.com/

It may seem hard to believe these days, but hip-hop at its roots is a very experimental artform that flirted with the avant garde pretty early on. Proto-rappers The Last Poets had both controversial Afrocentric perspectives and strong jazz inclinations. Afrika Bambataa's "Planet Rock" was built on a sample from German electro-pioneers Kraftwerk. The Bomb Squad production of Public Enemy's greatest records owes just as much to skronking, astringent horn and sax squeals as it does to funk and rock rhythms. The Beastie Boys opus Paul's Boutique had a kaleidoscopic, pop culture-mashing production courtesy of the Dust Brothers that was postmodern almost before such a thing existed. Most Native Tongues-era groups heavily used jazz and house elements in their palette. Even as late as the early to mid '90s, producers like RZA and Prince Paul were finding clever uses for dissonant textures that took nothing away from their ability to create straight bangers.

And then the gangsta rap revolution and East/West rivalry boomed along with the rise of the Dirty South and mainstream rap settled into a sort of general stagnation, chained to too-smooth G-Funk and the outright lazy sampling of Puff Daddy/Diddy/whatever the fuck that shiny suit calls himself now, followed by crunk, Swizz Beatz, hyphy, Neptunes and Kanye. At the risk of sounding like some idiot backpacker, nowadays finding a truly creative hip-hop album is a task akin to picking diamonds out of elephant shit. White-boy indie rap often isn't much better than its flossin' radio counterpart, what with its necrophilia of hip-hop's good ol' days in lieu of anything original, or deliberate obscurity and wordiness to mask a lack of quality beats and energy.

From this middling and staid scene, Dalek (sorry, stupid keyboard won't let me make omlaut) is a NJ duo with music that rips the pretenders apart like a giant chainsaw. Lying in a strange no-mans-land between avant garde industrial, hip-hop and metal, they are probably one of the few (if not only) hip-hop groups that could get away with touring and even collaborating with the likes of Isis, Faust, The Melvins, and Godflesh without sounding entirely out of their depth. With MC dalek's intense Afro-conscious lyrics and very, very angry yet eloquent delivery plus Oktopus' devastating combination of traditional hip-hop drum and bass with what can only be described as Shoegaze From Hell, there hasn't been anything in the genre as urgent and bruising as Absence in a long time. This blows away even the similarly abrasive production jobs of underground god El-P, who is otherwise probably Dalek's closest sonic analogue. And yes they build that shit themselves--little to no sampling involved. Perfect for all the irrelevant rockist tards who love to dismiss the genre out of hand for its assumed "lack of musical talent."

The album begins with the six-minute fusillade "Distorted Prose," which rises from an impressive a capella intro (this guy can spit, no doubt) into a massive jet engine roar and later complemented by some thoroughly ill scratching from collaborator Still. It crashes to a shuddering stop and you're given a few precious seconds to catch your breath, a perfect summation of the overarching sonic violence barely contained throughout the album.

"Asylum (Permanent Underclass)" paints a brutally dystopic picture of blacks thrown to the wolves of American capitalism and the police state and unlike most similarly conscious hip-hop artists the backdrop matches the bleakness of its subject matter, with a pounding time change around the 3'30" mark. "Culture For Dollars" offers probably the catchiest chorus in the entire album ("Who trades culture for dollars?/The fool or the scholar/Griot, poet, or white collar?") and is one of the few tracks where Dalek's able rapping isn't nearly swallowed up by the oppressive din--probably the most accessible offering here along with the similar "Ever Somber." The title track's spacey interlude is followed by the tense and appropriately titled "A Beast Caged" and the nearly eight minute epic "In Midst of Struggle." The vicious clamor of "Eyes To Form Shadows" calls to mind a hip-hop Sonic Youth, dalek railing against walls of distortion and feedback between the wailing siren sonics that accompany the verses.

Absence is a focused, monolithic death machine, mostly for the better. Its only downside is that 57 minutes of grinding hip-hop colossus with not too much variation aside from the title track and similar instrumental "Koner" can get overwhelming, as can MC dalek's streams of agitprop--subtlety is not their strong suit here, and their later works are a bit better in this regard. But if you're reading this column I doubt you're looking for subtlety anyway. Bottom line, this is perfect hip-hop for jaded heads and adventurous metal/industrial lovers alike, and carries on the original pioneering spirit of the form without ever bending to B-boy anachronism (Jurassic 5, I'm looking at you).

Translation:

This album inhabits an interesting position, with enough hip-hop in it to not be immediately likeable by rap-metal dudebros (Rage Against The Machine this is not) or straight metalheads, while more mainstream oriented hip-hop heads might balk at the general aesthetic and rejection of conventions such as guest rappers and emphasis on voice. A healthy selection of Definitive Jux-related artists (El-P, Cannibal Ox, Mr Lif etc.) would probably be a good starting point for the uninitiated coming from the rap side.

It's also worth mentioning that the aggro-hop group Techno Animal (a collaboration with Godflesh/Jesu's Justin Broadrick) and their best album Brotherhood of The Bomb is very, very similar and definitely a good listen for anyone into this.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: The Residents- Third Reich 'N Roll (1976) & Eskimo (1979)

Ralph Records; February 1976, September 1979
http://www.myspace.com/theresidents

It could be argued that in a sense, The Residents aren't even a band so much as a bunch of like-minded weirdos. Their primary mission has always been Art with a capital A rather than just music per se. They don't have the chops of Zappa or the free jazz inclinations of Beefheart and others, or the po-mo genre salad approach of John Zorn or Mr. Bungle--hell to some listeners they barely qualify as musicians. Through their occasionally somewhat primitive methods and masked obnoxiousness, The Residents have always been about grand statements of oddity, proudly trumpeting the Theory of Obscurity--the less commercial, the better. They are self indulgent, and damn proud of it.

How self indulgent? Well, let's see--they made a recording in '74 appropriately titled Not Available that they locked away for almost five years, on purpose, with the concept that it would only be released after the members had forgotten about it. The group records under the moniker The Cryptic Corporation, and all of their live outings have been in costume (usually their classic eyeball masks)--to this day no one knows who the hell does what. The live shows themselves are chock full of insane props, multimedia showcases and elaborate stage production that would've made Peter Gabriel-era Genesis blush. Every single album they've realized since their official debut Meet The Residents (which almost got them sued by Capitol and EMI for the cover art) has been a conceptual work in some way or another. A three-sided album, forty tracks of one-minute mock ad jingles, a surrealist Elvis biography, live storytelling, suites about Bible characters? Yes to all of the above.

In light of all that the two albums featured here are probably the least strange entries in their oeuvre. All relative, of course.

The group's second release Third Reich N' Roll has one of the most iconic covers of all time--a young-ish Dick Clark in Nazi regalia holding a carrot, while crossdressing mini-Hitlers traipse all over the fluffy pink clouds behind him. The whole concept is a bit of silly musical Godwin, comparing the staid oldies of corporate radio to fascism but fuck, with a cover like that you have to wonder what's in store for the buyer of said vinyl. And this doesn't disappoint. Made up of two side-long suites ("Swastikas On Parade" and "Hitler Was A Vegetarian"), The Residents assembled covers of '60s and early '70s pop standards and then took a giant shit on them in the best possible way.

After a brief sample of the German-translated "Let's Twist Again" the album flies off into some kind of maniacal proto-industrial/punk/Krautrock/WTF concoction, the source material violated by a kitchen sink of toy instruments, garbled and bizarre vocals, evil minor-key synths and random sound effects to the point where they are only somewhat recognizable. Ever wanted to hear "A Horse With No Name" as a funeral march? It's here. A German version of "Papa's Got A Brand New Bag" with dying-animal trumpet bleats? Yup. "Yummy Yummy Yummy" warped into some Middle Eastern raga? Check. Also one of the weirdest versions of FM sacred cow "Light My Fire" you will ever hear, and a truly sublime mash-up of "Hey Jude/Sympathy For The Devil" that is a great payoff after almost forty minutes of total headfuck. On some versions of the album there's even a gloriously abrasive take on "(Can't Get No) Satisfaction" that predates the '77 punk boom by a year or so.

Eskimo might be even weirder, and sounds like nothing else they ever did. Here they abandon Western music signposts (or anything else really) and record forty minutes of tribal chants, synthesizers and the occasional homemade wind instrument in a tongue-in-cheek attempt to capture what Inuit life must've been like.

And despite the group's inherent goofiness--they couldn't resist inserting buried references to Coca-Cola and other things--they mostly succeed. Eskimo has a truly unsettling, cold and alien ambiance that no other artist or band could come close to, a couple decades of black metal and electronica recorded since then notwithstanding. Tracks like "The Walrus Hunt" and "The Angry Angakok" with their hypnotic gibberish chants along with the creepy sound effects could really wig a listener out under certain, uh, "conditions." At times Eskimo achieves an eerie splendor reminiscent of the better Brian Eno or Steven Roach albums, and the outro of "The Festival of Death" even manages to be sort of pretty, kind of an anomaly when it comes to The Residents but a nice retort to anyone who thinks they're just being weird and anti-musical for its own sake. And it all ends the same way it began--with the sound of freezing Arctic winds. You'd probably have to look to anthropological field recordings to get something more authentic, and even then it probably wouldn't be as subtly engrossing as this album.

Through their fifty year long career few groups have defined arty iconoclasm better than The Residents have, and while their embrace of kitsch may strike some listeners as a novelty their broad creative horizons place them in the same growing realms as other champions of the American avant-garde. Whether it's from the inspired amateurism of early period or their later adventures in the live medium, they truly embody forward-thinking artistry in an era where many pose as the real deal and fall way short.

Translation:

If you want to hear oldies spoofed in some truly twisted and sick ways Third Reich N' Roll comes pretty highly recommended, obviously. Fans of Krautrock (some parts I swear sound exactly like Can) and early industrial would probably really enjoy this as well.

Eskimo is a bit of a harder sell. Despite being highly regarded among Residents fans it's one of those "your mileage may vary" albums, especially if you haven't heard any of the more notable ambient artists (the aforementioned Eno and Roach, and others). Try some of that first and see if it grows on you before coming here.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: Doom Metal Special! Burning Witch v. Khanate

Southern Lord; 1998, 2008/October 6, 2003
http://www.southernlord.com/band_BNW.php
http://www.plotkinworks.com/khanate/

This review--more of a shootout, really--has been a long time coming.

My entry for Things Viral had been sitting on my computer in semi-completed form since around November of last year, when we were still up to our eyeballs with work on our decade-end list. I wrote an extremely short blurb for it, under minimal protest, that I felt would adequately scratch the surface of an album I really wanted to dig into and flesh out every gory detail of in this column as one of the most extreme (TO TEH MAXX!!1) musical experiences that would ever be featured here.

Then sometime in the interim, Chris introduced me to Burning Witch. And well... into the shitbin my old review went.

Before going further some background is required on these two titans of the Southern Lord label, and how they ended up following similar evolutionary paths to somewhat different conclusions. Burning Witch is the earlier of the two bands, active from 1995 to 1998 and featuring the formidable talents of guitarist Stephen O'Malley, the mighty drone lord who would later end up in genre legends SunnO))) and... Khanate, only three years after Burning Witch split up. O'Malley's guitar presence would ultimately define and shape the work of both bands, which otherwise share no members. You can also hear echoes of both bands in SunnO)))'s own album Black One but that has a more obvious black metal aesthetic, whereas the other two walk previously untrodden and very, very scary ground.

Burning Witch is a band I'd often heard described as "apocalyptic," but after listening to weird shit including lots of gutbucket, angst-ridden and low-end pulverizing acts like Melvins, Neurosis, Boris, Meshuggah and Electric Wizard that kind of descriptor gets thrown around enough to lose its meaning. But rest assured, when even jaded ears hear Burning Witch and use that word (usually preceded by various superlative expletives and/or shat pants), they mean every fucking syllable. The 2008 reissue of Crippled Lucifer (Seven Psalms for Our Lord of Light) includes both of their major releases, Towers... (recorded by Steve Albini, so you know it's quality) and Rift. Canyon. Dreams., consolidating ten tracks into about an hour of punishing aural suicide.

This stuff is pure madness--all tortured guitar grind and bass tuned so low that I wonder how the strings even move over crashing, deliberate rhythms that suggest Black Sabbath slowed to about a third of the BPM, spread over tracks that average around eight minutes. But even with O'Malley's guitarwork, a balance of dismal, slowly decaying riffs and screeds of noisy feedback (he even pulls off some sick Iommi-worthy trills in "Sacred Predictions"), Burning Witch's sonic palette generally doesn't deviate too far from the doom metal mold. But it doesn't really matter, and here's why:

I don't know which Event Horizon-esque hell dimension their vocalist (who goes by the somewhat lame pseudonym Edgy 59) hails from, but he is the defining characteristic of Burning Witch, and what elevates them over the standard doom metal outfit. His default mode is an inhumanly horrific, psychotic shriek that just bleeds evil, in a way I've heard no other vocalist do even in other realms of extreme metal--with one possible exception. And just after you start getting acclimated to this, he sings(!) some haunting passages with a strangled midrange wail that might be even more unsettling. He even indulges in creepy little tics, like a witchy cackle in the conclusion of "The Bleeder." The lyrics are the usual harrowing quasi-Satanic imagery you can expect with this sort of material, but it wouldn't fucking matter if it was the opening theme of My Little Pony--Edgy 59's voice would make them deliciously, indescribably terrifying, and leave most vocalists participating in metal as a whole looking like a bunch of tryhard adolescents.

Leaving big shoes to fill, the unit that ultimately continued Burning Witch's legacy was an all-star doom supergroup--two members of OLD, Alan Dubin and James Plotkin, along with the aforementioned O'Malley and Tim Wyskida of Blind Idiot God (who played very different music, but besides the point). Khanate's 2001 album ended up sounding a lot like Burning Witch, even if the sonics were a bit clearer, Dubin's screeches a bit more coherent, the stretches of void between thundering slams a bit more indulged. There were still nods given to the genre signposts, including riffs and a discernible, albeit really goddamn slow tempo. The sound could still be described as metal, just more abstract than the norm.

Things Viral is where the band really defines itself and throws all trappings right out the window from the get go. If Crippled Lucifer was the sound of the world giving up the ghost in a chaotic onslaught of fire and brimstone, Things Viral would be what remained after the sky burned out, the dying fires receded and a new ruined Earth revealed, cold and stripped of all life.

Riffs have completely given way to bleak drones that seem to stretch on for eternities, only to abruptly strike with a single, shuddering chord or passages of expertly conjured feedback. Wyskida's percussion is more impressionistic than anything--there is no steady pulse, only the odd crash of a cymbal, the funereal sound of a distant tom, or a sudden rising clamor that punctuates the next jarring assault and ends as soon as it began. The first two tracks don't really have a beginning or end, they simply drift in from the darkened fog and hover inside the listener's head for twenty minutes before fading into the next unobtrusively. "Dead" (NSFW!) is really the only track out of four that sounds like it was at all composed--at 9:28 it's also the shortest on the album by far.

Alan Dubin is an interesting study of contrasts with Edgy--the former is as perfectly mixed, clear and comprehensible as the latter isn't. Shrieks emanate from the core of his body in long terrible streams, hanging on every grim word for seconds at a time like his life depends on it. His murderous stream-of-consciousness lyrics are the only accompaniment to this sonic wasteland, and his fractured narrative presents truly disturbing revelations ("pieces of us in my hands, on the floor.... in my pockets"). Edgy's Jekyll-and-Hyde act evokes imagery of some poor bastard being slowly vivisected and eaten by an ancient creature out of Lovecraftian horror; Dubin's voice is that of the shadowy being witnessing the spectacle. And that being is trying to drive you insane. Have I mangled enough metaphors yet?

So... which is better? Who wins?

Tough call. I think the average listener (right, like any of those would be listening to this shit) would probably enjoy and identify with Crippled Lucifer more, as it has actual riffs, a little more variety and hints of structure coupled to a general metal aesthetic. Edgy's vocals render the words mostly incomprehensible which for people who giggle while reading/listening to metal lyrics might be an important factor. However, musically Things Viral is far more groundbreaking, and--in this author's opinion--even more depressive and frightening in its abject nihilism. The performances also feel a little more focused, even as they stretch over ten minutes.

Verdict? At the risk of copping out, these are the Alpha and Omega of this genre, and you can't fully appreciate the power of each until you listen to both. So if you have the testicular fortitude and a couple hours or so to kill, do it.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O.- Electric Heavyland (2002)

Alien8 Recordings; October 6, 2002
http://www.acidmothers.com/

With our decade end list more or less finished I'd like to announce that no, this column has not permanently disappeared into the ether. As a matter of fact assuming that life doesn't proceed to kick me in the posterior further I intend to release a batch of another twenty reviews like I did last year (maybe more), and this time space them out a bit more prudently so you, good reader, get fewer stretches of zero activity. I've enjoyed being a contributor to this here blog and hope that my reviews inspire more long-term readership in the year to come.

So now that I've dispensed with the fucking Oxbridge pleasantries, let's have at this one shall we?
__________________________________________

Acid Mothers Temple are continuing evidence that Japan produces way more crazed, prolific noisemakers per capita than anywhere else on Earth. And when I say prolific, I fucking mean it--since the inception of the band (which has grown to more of a loose collective, really) in 1995 the Acid Mothers have recorded a catalog of approximately one hundred releases, in various formats both limited edition and still in print, live and studio, under a series of different guises and with various lineups and collaborations and most of it released under their own label. That's a pretty serious work ethic.

Founding member and guitarist Kawabata Makoto remains the single Fripp-like constant in all the outfit's projects, and Electric Heavyland like most of the other records he's played on adheres very strongly to his general formula and vision. That is, don't expect a "song-oriented" AMT album, ever. No, the name of the game here is boundary-pushing (soundwise, lengthwise, etc.) free-form improvisation and experimentation that would make even the wildest of '70s prog acts look pretty limpdick. The volume level varies, but usually only by marginal degrees, and even AMT at their most accessible won't be getting radio play any time soon.

And this album is one of their loudest. Take the craziest space rock freakouts of Hawkwind in their Space Ritual prime, combine with the giant amp stacks of Blue Cheer, throw in the guitar musings of Tony Iommi, Hendrix and Ritchie Blackmore, add a totally wigged-out acid casualty on vocals (this one goes by the name "Cotton Casino") and put Akita Merzbow behind the boards and you have a general idea of what Electric Heavyland entails. This is some goddamn weapons-grade psychedelia right here and by no means the grooooovy, twee Donovan/Byrds/Zombies/Syd Barrett variety, oh no, but a thick swirling miasma of gritty distortion-pedal frenzy, spastic drumming, synth squigglies, wordless screams and a continuous low end rumble that suggests volcanic activity more than anything played by humans. There are only three tracks on the album, and none are less than fifteen minutes long. Get the picture?

This is just about the last thing you want to listen to while high. Try playing this album for an aging Deadhead and he'll probably hide under the furniture convinced that the aliens have returned to abduct him.

And yet--there is a psychotic beauty in what this band does. These jams do have a finite beginning and a finite end, and there is definite chemistry and phenomenally tight playing between those points even as the whole album feels like an endless cacophony. Take for example the lead guitar break seven minutes into the chaotic assault of "Atomic Rotary Grinding God" that is a prelude to about a minute of eerie ambient synth doodling, which then careens into a roaring Motorhead pummel. Then there's the lumbering, deranged riff that kickstarts "Loved and Confused" which is steadily deconstructed over the seventeen-minute track length. The closer "Phantom of Galactic Magnum" (Top 3 Most Badass Song Title, ever) finally blasts off into full freak-flag brainmelter mode, displaying some downright free jazzy inclinations while still being loud enough to obliterate entire solar systems. Sun Ra would be proud.

As of this date, I've heard only three of Acid Mothers Temple's recordings, but Electric Heavyland definitely makes me want to check out more of their oeuvre. This is the ultimate in space/psychedelic/stoner/whatever while still possessing the stones to thoroughly slaughter most any death metal band extant. Lovers of six-string mayhem need look no further.

Translation:

If you love Hawkwind and other '70s mainstays from the harder end of the stoner rock spectrum along with more modern bands like Monster Magnet, there's a fair chance you can survive this. Fans of drone like Earth, SunnO))) and the like also seem to get into Electric Heavyland, despite being nearly their total sonic opposites other than track length and volume level. Everyone else is going to wonder what astral plane their brain left to after 51 minutes. This album does not fuck around, so caveat emptor.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: Ween- Pure Guava (1992)

Electra; November 15, 1992
http://www.ween.com/

Lo and behold, the first entry in my column to actually have a charting single in the U.S.

"Push th' Lil Daisies" made it all the way to #21 (complete with a Beavis 'N' Butthead cameo) and is quite possibly the strangest song to do so--an irreverent, cryptic piece of helium-voiced pop in an age largely dominated by self-serious dudes in flannel, it launched the otherwise (and undeservedly) obscure duo of Dean 'n' Gene into major-label stardom... where they resided for maybe a few months before disappearing back into the deep drug-induced fog from whence they came and where they are far more comfortable.

And believe me, this is one of those classic cases where the single is the most accessible track on an otherwise challenging release. However it's not like "Push th' Lil Daisies" is unrepresentative of the rest of Pure Guava--the album does in fact sound like that. More or less. Just add a bunch more electronic vocal distortion, genre bending and weapons-grade hallucinogenics and you're on your way.

Pure Guava represents something of a transitional album for these guys. It's the last Ween release recorded with just the duo, a drum machine and a four-track; the next album Chocolate & Cheese was recorded in a professional studio, and most of the albums after it were similarly lush and fairly song-oriented (by Ween standards). Pure Guava still has a roughly equal ratio of fully formed tracks, utterly stoned rambling and sophomoric anti-songs like their previous adventures in lo-fi but apparently is a lot more tuneful and less noisy--I haven't heard the albums prior, so I can neither confirm nor deny this.

What I can confirm though is that despite their Zappa-esque penchant for fourth grade humor (they have a song titled "Poop Ship Destroyer" for Christ's sake) and every annoying/hilarious vocal filter under the Sun, the Brothers Ween are extremely talented musicians with a gift for crafting some very catchy if askew hooks. Seriously. "Little Birdy" sounds like a pretty acoustic ditty played on a busted phonograph. "The Stallion Pt. 3" is a truly neat piece of spacey sorta-prog, even if the lyrics are exercises in total non-sequitor. "Sarah" and "Loving U Thru It All" are downright beautiful ballads played seemingly without an ironic sneer in sight. They also show a amusing talent for appropriating other styles--"Springtime" is excellent Prince homage, "Pumpin 4 The Man" is straight-up hoedown Ween style, and "Don't Get 2 Close 2 My Fantasy" is a fucking Bowie song. No I don't mean it's a cover. I mean it sounds eerily, exactly like Bowie, in a way that probably made the Thin White Duke check his coke-era outtakes to see if something was lifted.

Of course this is a Ween record and we can't go without mentioning some of their browner (as in the acid) excursions, none being more brown than the five-minute lapse of sanity known as "Mourning Glory," which accurately depicts the state of being completely skullfucked while low-flying jumbo jets pass overhead and some jerk is verbally assaulting you. "Hey Fat Boy (Asshole)" and "Reggaejunkiejew" are even more silly and casually offensive than their titles imply. "I Play It Off Legit" sounds like the boys were huffing paint thinner and just hit record.

Ween's diverse and always outre career on the goofier side of psychedelia has put them in the league of other American underground legends such as The Residents, Mr. Bungle, and The Butthole Surfers, and Pure Guava is just one step on their way to greatness. The slight spoilage of MTV aside, this is a downright fun and hilarious record that pushes the bounds of music and good taste while being terminally addictive. You don't need a bong to enjoy it either--though it probably couldn't hurt.

Translation:

If you enjoy the aforementioned bands and don't have Pure Guava, it's quite possible that you're either retarded or too wasted to go to the record store. This is exactly what the doctor ordered. Dig some change out of the couch and go.

For the newbie, I would highly recommend the more easygoing Chocolate & Cheese followed by The Mollusk, their prog-rock opus and a straight masterpiece. Once you've played those into the ground and crave more Boognish, Pure Guava is the next stop.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: The Body- All The Waters of The Earth Shall Turn to Blood (2010)

At A Loss; 2010
http://www.myspace.com/thevisionshallcometopass

Despite its obvious pedigree of inaccessibility, doom metal and drone has sadly not been featured in this column as of yet. Today I plan to change this, and with a truly engaging and strange album at that.

The Body are in loose terms a two-piece band made up of militant Arkansas expats Chip King (guitar/vocals) and Lee Buford (drums) living in Providence, RI--however in practice, The Body encompasses a huge group of collaborators (including a 13-member choir on this, the band's second album). Within the conventional doom assault lies creatively fucked-up sample work, viola, drum machines, and strains of pure noise. The Body's attack reminds me of Today Is The Day circa-Sadness Will Prevail, if Steve Austin had been listening to Neurosis and Khanate instead of Slayer and Converge.

Pretty fucking awesome, in other words.

While the lyrics are supposedly inspired by such fine upstanding individuals as Jim Jones and Charles Manson and are routinely blood-soaked, nihilistic invocations of apocalypse, King's strained screaming renders them all a psychotic, unintelligible stream of consciousness. Frankly this doesn't hurt the impact of the record one bit--the dismal, brutally atonal and bleak music could produce fevered dream visions of Doomsday all on its own. Before you listen to it, I'd advise cranking the volume up, as this is a conspicuously DIY affair with very raw, lo-fi production values, to the point where I thought there was something wrong with my computer on first listen. I can't decide whether it's annoying or if it adds to the effect.

The angelic yet ominous tones of the choir are the first thing you hear on the album, track one "A Body" taking its time and deliberately layering in the female voices for a hypnotic effect. After five minutes of this and contemplating whether you bought the wrong CD, King and Buford bring the pain with some truly grim noise as the choir continues to accompany them--think seraphs falling headfirst from the sky, wings blazing with a trail of smoke. Following that is the most accessible track, "A Curse," with an honest-to-goodness, hard charging 4/4 pulse and its jagged guitar line gradually dissolving into more ugly sludge over four minutes. Just when you think you can nail down this band's MO, they throw "Empty Hearth" and its heavily manipulated snake handler chants at you for a truly unnerving effect.

The album continues in this fashion, the violent churn and repetitive riffing punctuated by bizarre left turns, all the way up to the epic closer "Lathspell I Name You" which is the entire kitchen sink--a hypnotic thirteen minutes of blood-letting guitar, King shrieking his throat out, droning viola, a lone female vocalist sounding somewhere between agony and ecstasy, noise washes, a sample-heavy eerie industrial interlude and Buford pounding his kit with tree trunks in various tempos. And with a single droning, despairing note, the fifty minute album comes to an end, leaving you to check out your window and see if the world is still there.

Translation:

If you like any of the bands mentioned above, All The Waters... is a pretty natural progression and a must-have. Pitchfork is seldom right about anything. This is one of those times.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: Big Black- The Hammer Party /The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape/Songs About Fucking (1986/1987/1987)

1982-1985/1986, 1986/1987, 1987
Touch & Go Records

Yep, that's correct, I'm reviewing all three records out of Big Black's discography up in this bitch. As they are one of my favorite bands of all time, it didn't feel right to pick and choose.

Born in staid Illinois and without a doubt the most confrontational, caustic and brutal indie band of their era (even amongst other pillars of '80s No-Wave/noise rock such as Sonic Youth, Swans and The Birthday Party), Big Black was both the launchpad of righteous DIY curmudgeon/recording engineer/guitarist Steve Albini and celebrated independent label Touch & Go, which went on to sign numerous excellent experiments in noisy terror such as the mighty Jesus Lizard and quieter but no less intriguing bands like Don Caballero, Polvo, Dirty Three and Slint.

With aluminum-bodied custom guitars tuned for scathing feedback and metal-on-metal clang, a drum machine (credited as "Roland") providing the jackhammer backbeat and lyrical topics focusing on white trash depravity and crime, Big Black were uglier than the audience of a monster truck rally. They were the sonic equivalent of a John Waters film or Lynch's Blue Velvet, skewering and exposing things you didn't want to look at, things you didn't want to know about, the shadowy aspects of seedy small town life and filthy trailer parks. They brought the cauterizing noise bath of artsier predecessors like Throbbing Gristle and Cabaret Voltaire to the masses, infusing a sense of songwriting and minimalist groove from post-punk bands such as Suicide, Wire, Gang of Four, Killing Joke and Naked Raygun (whose vocalist/bassist Jeff Pezzati and guitarist Santiago Durango ended up playing for Big Black) to make it even more direct and bludgeoning. The result is clearly not for the timid, and was extremely controversial at the time--Albini's pointedly offensive, epithet-filled rants got him labeled as racist and misogynist (which he isn't) and along with the brutally cathartic live antics (such as setting off bricks of firecrackers on stage) the band got booted out of several clubs. In spite of this, they managed to build a surprisingly large underground following.

The Hammer Party, Big Black's first record, is a collection of EP's--1982's Lungs, 1983's Bulldozer, and 1985's Racer-X. Lungs is actually the closest thing to a Albini solo record available--just him, his guitar, Roland and an 8-track in his living room, and the result is about as crude as you'd expect. Still it results in at least one excellent track and future staple, "Steelworker," and set the stage for the next two EP's with the full lineup of Pezzati, Durango, and Urge Overkill drummer Pat Byrne. Bulldozer was a more fully developed version of Lungs' sound, with redneck sagas "Cables" and "Texas" along with the neurotic "I'm A Mess" being the highlights. Racer-X broadened the band's visions a little, with a sleeker production quality and even some proto-math rock leanings like the track "Sleep!"

However, none of the three EP's can compare to their first proper LP, the landmark Atomizer (which was bundled with the EP Headache and "Heartbeat/Things To Do Today" single for The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape release). Losing Pezzati for new bassist Dave Riley only hardened the band's assault, as his funk-inflected basslines were an excellent counterpoint to Albini and Durango's even nastier guitarwork. The lyrical topics followed suit--"Jordan, Minnesota" is quite simply one of the most terrifying songs of all time, documenting the sordid tale of a Midwestern child prostitution ring from the molester's point of view. The equally brutal "Kerosene" depicts the trailer park pastime of being so bored and sick of everything that self-immolation becomes entertainment, and "Big Money" is a Swans-like rumination on the abuse of police authority. The (slightly) quieter "Bad Houses" is an interesting departure, and probably as reflective as Big Black ever got. While the bonus material is a slight step down from the heights of Atomizer, the punishing high-speed barrage "Ready Men" (to this day my favorite Big Black song) and the gruesome hitman vignette "Things To Do Today" are as good as anything else they did.

By 1987, Big Black was starting to erode due to internal struggles. Few bands had the balls to announce their breakup before releasing an album at the height of their popularity and a worldwide tour, but being beholden to none, Big Black did just that. And then dropped the (AWESOMELY TITLED) swansong Songs About Fucking, their biggest commercial success and to many a fan the band's best record (this reviewer prefers Atomizer by a slight margin). "The Power of Independent Trucking" kicks the album off with a bang, a furious assault of screeching guitars and thundering drum machine over a fuzzed-out Albini vocal. This is followed by an incrementally more sedate but still bitterly sarcastic and sleazy cover of Kraftwerk's "The Model" and the filth and fury continue with trademark asshole anthem "Bad Penny," psychopathic surf-rock "Columbian Necktie" and the venomous proto-industrial grind of "Precious Thing" and "Tiny, King of The Jews." By the time Cheap Trick's (one of Albini's favorite bands) "He's A Whore" is subjected to Big Black's sexual predator treatment, you'll want to hear the whole album again.

Big Black were defiantly unorthodox in their business dealings, hated the digital compact disc format, and released no videos on MTV, yet their recorded output will survive forever in the collections of lesser noise rock and industrial bands and for good fucking reason. Shocking and polarizing even today, their discography remains the widely emulated creme de la creme of noise rock and an essential touchstone for fans of independently made and independently minded music.

Translation:

If you already like mid-period industrial bands such as Ministry and Godflesh, or post-punk mainstays Gang of Four, Killing Joke and their modern progeny these albums are no-brainers. Otherwise, I would recommend Wire's Pink Flag, Killing Joke's 1979 debut, Naked Raygun's Jettison and maybe PiL's Second Edition as preparation for these.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: Einsturzende Neubaten- Halber Mensch (1985)

1985; Some Bizarre Records/Potomak
http://www.neubauten.org/

Einsturzende Neubaten's name means "Exploding New Buildings" in English. As early pioneers in the art of brainpan-eviscerating industrial noise, this West Berlin act has lived up to their name while steadily refining their sound over the past thirty years. Their performances have always been a combination of highbrow Euro performance art, improvisational insanity and the joy and freedom of making a huge goddamn racket, and even though they've actually discovered an excellent sense of melody and subtlety over the years (probably adopted from frontman Blixa Bargeld's other band, Nick Cave's Bad Seeds), they are still determinedly unconventional as evidenced by their predilection for makeshift instruments such as pneumatic air tubes, sheets of metal and barrels used for percussion, power saws and drills, etc. If you ask dyed-in-the-wool EN fans where the evolution from brutal clanging sonic terrorism into nuanced songcraft started, they may point to 1989's Haus der Luge (whose "Feurio!" became an underground club hit and the topic of several remixes) or they may cite later opuses such as 1993's Tabula Rasa or even 2000's Silence Is Sexy (which remains my favorite album of theirs).

However in this reviewer's opinion it starts right here with Halber Mench. Early EN recordings before this were basically straight jackhammering with no melody whatsoever, with found objects, construction implements, rudimentary synths, even Blixa's voice, all reduced to a single role: percussion. It's fun stuff, albeit in small to moderate doses. While there's still plenty of crazy scraping, clanking and crackling noises in Halber Mench, the core membership of Blixa, Alexander Hacke, Mark Chung and crazed percussionist FM Einheit had discovered how to incorporate a sense of structure into their junkyard madness, and there was even some prominent guitar in a recognizable state of tune (!), a semi-melodic pop song with noise solo (!!) and a borderline dance tune (!!!). Blixa's voice was no longer all harsh Teutonic screaming, either--on songs like "Seele Brennt," "Letztes Biest (Am Himmel)" and "Sehnsucht" he revealed a menacing whisper and some poetic, baritone singing--elements that he would expand on over the course of his career. These art school kids were growing up, as were their musical ambitions.

The album begins very strangely even for these guys. The title track is a haunting, shamanic chant, completely a capella. Its alien quality carries across the rest of the record, even as the vocals yield completely to sheer mechanical clatter as they do on "Das Schaben"--a nine and a half minute noise bath that is the clear centerpiece of the album and hour-long movie (also named Halber Mensch) depicting their 1985 tour of Japan--like Germany, a place once similarly ravaged by war and post-industrial decay. Coincidence? Don't think so. All over this album you can find themes of death, deconstruction ("Desire comes out of chaos"), Cold War sociopolitics and existentialism/nihilism in the Nietzschean tradition proving that under the din, EN always had something intelligent to say. If you can speak German. Don't worry, a translation is provided.

Halber Mench is essential to an understanding of the development of this extraordinary outfit from a bunch of angry Teutonic punks with power tools into the amazing, cinematic sonic juggernaut they are now. Along with Throbbing Gristle's D.O.A., Foetus' Nail and SPK's Leichenschrei no discerning rivethead should be without this early industrial document in their collection.

Translation:

If you thought that Rammstein or even KMFDM was the epitome of scathing Germanic noise, well.... you may want to put this album on hold for a little while. Try Silence Is Sexy, Perpetuum Mobile or Tabula Rasa first before coming here. You don't have to hear SPK or Throbbing Gristle beforehand, but that can't hurt either. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. Yes I know that is a Nietzsche quote, I'll cut this review off before it gets any more pretentious.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: Ulver- Nattens Madrigal: Aatte Hymne til Ulven i Manden (1997)

March 3, 1997; Century Media
http://www.jester-records.com/ulver/ulver.html

Although Norwegian band Ulver still exists today and is still led by Patton-esque mad scientist and vocalist Kristoffer Rygg (A.K.A. Garm, Trickster G, God Head), the Ulver of the mid-nineties bears zero resemblance to the band that released coldly atmospheric electronic/industrial albums like 2005's Blood Inside and 2007's Shadows of The Sun. Instead they shared a place in the mid-period Scandinavian black metal scene, a musical movement best known for collectives of church-burning paganist misanthropes such as Emperor, Mayhem and Darkthrone. However Ulver's aims were always considerably less about the corpse paint/inverted cross/battleaxe image and more about artistry (which is not to say Emperor weren't seriously badass in their own way, but I digress), releasing a "trilogie" of albums with a high degree of craft and conceptual trappings. Their first LP, 1994's Bergtatt, was a landmark in the genre for incorporating olden Scandinavian folk forms, right down to the use of archaic Danish lyrics. They followed that with an album of classical folk titled Kveldssanger. However Ulver's third album Nattens Madrigal: Aatte Hymne til Ulven i Manden (Madrigal of The Night: Eight Hymns to the Wolf in Man) totally rejects any clean vocals and almost all of the acoustic guitar in lieu of an utterly savage, necro as fuck 44-minute blast of black metal.

Now, traditionally black metal has prided itself on a very lo-fi, primitivist aesthetic, rejecting clinical studio sheen for sound quality that often sounds like a demo. Most "kVLT" bands in the genre say this raw approach adds to the authenticity and "evil" atmosphere of the recording but frankly it usually just sounds like what it is, which is poorly recorded shit. Take for example Darkthrone's overly lauded "classic" Transylvanian Hunger. The instruments have zero power--the amateurishly played guitar sounds like a tinny buzzsaw, the drums have all the weight of pencils tapping a desk, the bass is totally inaudible, and the vocalist shrieks about Satan and evil and things that bump in the night while sounding like a cartoon goblin. Purists might cream themselves over this, but the neophyte will probably find this approach more laughable than sinister.

Nattens Madrigal is no exception to the lo-fi sound quality. Legend has it, the band took the label's money, put an 8-track in the middle of the Scandinavian forest, recorded the album, and then spent the rest of the cash on Armani suits, whores, booze and nice cars. Even if this wasn't the case, the album totally sounds like it. The production quality is so trebly, so harsh that it fundamentally changes how you listen to the music, and will actually take you aback the moment "Hymn I" tears through your speakers. It's the sonic equivalent of bleeding rare meat. The tremelo riffing of the guitars and Garm's horrific foreign-language shrieks dominate all generally leaving the drums a distant din of crashing cymbals and snare, and the bass, when heard, has virtually no punch to it.

However.... Nattens Madrigal is the total antithesis of goofy. It actually totally accomplishes the brutally cold and grim feel that most black metal bands strive for and generally fall short of, and not only that, it's packed with riffs and melodies that those bands would kill for (probably literally). Just to put an exclamation point on Ulver's astounding talent, the initial minute-long assault of blacker-than-black riffing in "Hymn I" quickly gives way to a beautiful and peaceful interlude of acoustic picking--the only one on the whole album--and then shifts into an electric variation on the same melody that will knock you out of your fucking chair.

The whole album is a formidable blurred maelstrom, with only the aforementioned acoustic break and the occasional nocturnal segue between tracks functioning as breathers. Tracks burst in with a few squeaks of feedback and end arbitrarily, often still blasting along after five minutes. There are no solos and few leads, and the ones present are usually squelched by the stormy production. However, despite the generally monolithic structure, there are plenty of noteworthy moments. The fade-in intro to "Hymn IV," accompanied by Garm's feral vocals is truly epic. "Hymn VI" begins with a triumphant major-key riff that sounds like something that would be played in Valhalla, while the main riff of "Hymn VIII" will incite rabid headbanging in even the most staid listeners. The album closes out on a magnificent crescendo of distortion and crashing drums that fills you with a feeling that you've listened to something truly immense, and all accomplished without a single cheesy keyboard or silly orchestral flourish (Cradle of Filth, I'm looking at you).

Nattens Madrigal (along with the previous two releases in the trilogie) is the embodiment of black metal excellence, its naturalistic atmosphere the result of careful craft and played with a precision that defies the genre. Ulver's early work remains incredibly influential and has been drawn on by a number of more ambitious genre-busting bands such as Agalloch and Wolves In The Throne Room, both of whom have gone on to release their own masterpieces. This is a necessary album for fans of boundary-pushing metal, totally worth the insane import price.

Translation:

Anyone new to black metal should probably try out Emperor, Immortal, Enslaved and Bathory first. Despite the relatively recent Pitchfork fascination with the genre, it still remains a tough listen for most and the over-the-top trappings of the scene don't exactly help, so bear that in mind. Ulver's Bergtatt is also a perfect warmup for this album, and an excellent release in its own right.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: Wolf Eyes- Human Animal (2006)

2006; Sub Pop
http://www.wolfeyes.net/

It took me a very long time to really appreciate what Wolf Eyes do, possibly because they are often placed under the broad umbrella of noise and power electronics, a genre I typically have little interest in despite my general enjoyment of outre music designed to clear rooms, break windows and alienate people. The works of noise artists like Akita Merzbow, Masonna and the like are frankly just dull and formless to me most of the time. Unending and undynamic sheets of everything-louder-than-everything-else electronic drone, screeches, screams, what have you is just so extreme and unyielding that it ends up having the opposite effect--boredom. Without any concessions to mood, atmosphere, rhythm, improvisation or composition you end up sitting there, staring at your watch and waiting for it to end. The few artists, mostly from industrial's formative years, that have succeeded at making listenable "noise" (hint: it's not) such as Throbbing Gristle, Whitehouse, SPK and early Einsturzende Neubaten have all recognized the value of these elements in their approach.

You can add Ann Arbor freaks Wolf Eyes to that list. All of their albums have combined hardcore screams, industrial clanking, creeping synth noises, blasts of cathartic feedback and even some wild saxophone skronk with careful pacing and skeletal rhythms to produce fascinatingly twisted mindfucking soundscapes fit to adorn avant-garde horror films. Human Animal, one of the few widely distributed CD releases out of a dauntingly huge and obscure discography, captures the team of Nate Young, John Olsen, Mike Connelly and former member turned producer Aaron Dilloway at the height of their necromancing powers.

Opener "A Million Years" is the huge ghostly monster on the cover slowly rising out of the swamp, a distant din of metallic crashes slowly getting louder as it approaches, accompanied by wounded animal squawks on sax and a piercing, inhuman screech that reaches directly down into your soul and tears it out. This track lets you know in no uncertain terms what you're about to get into.

Ready? Good. The end cleanly segues into the short high-frequency loop/drone bath "Lake of Roaches," followed by the eight-minute "Rationed Riot." Eerie high-pitched synths float in and out of a soupy lo-fi mix, barrel-like drums and the sounds of bubbling muck and blowing winds. The first recognizably human voice comes in, reciting some creepy passages of gore and decay obscured by the surrounding soundscape. The hideous wailing sax returns to usher this track to a close.

Then the title track hits, and all hell breaks loose. Heavily processed screams, crashing gongs (played both normally and backwards masked), feedback, and a thundering beat accompanied by baritone wordless chants that sound like they were sampled from an occult ritual give way to the utterly demented skullfuck that is "Rusted Mange," where human voice, synths and saxophone all compete to drown each other out, recorded in the ugliest, most distorted way possible.

The monster's attack ends, and now drifts in the pervasive fear of "Leper War." Basically a continuation of "A Million Years," but even more claustrophobic and dense. "The Driller" is the creme de la creme of brutal industrial noise, the soundtrack accompanying the marching deformed mutant armies of Hell as they emerge from the earth to consume and destroy everything in their path. Four minutes of pure ear rape. The album ends with a snarky, noise-punk cover of No Fucker's "Noise Not Music," which compared to the concentrated doom that came before is almost accessible in its instantly gratifying slap upside the head.

If anyone is to be named a worthy successor to the likes of late '70s and early '80s industrial, Wolf Eyes are in the front running. Not only have they added a degree of structure and accessibility to the avant-garde realms of power electronics, their attempts have also paradoxically managed to increase the intensity and atmosphere tenfold, pushing the bounds of the art. Human Animal (along with their previous album Burned Mind) from the music right down to the brilliant cover art is an organic, cohesive exercise in aural terror rivaled only by the likes of future column fodder Khanate and Today Is The Day.

Translation:

Um... well... try some Throbbing Gristle. If you somehow manage to survive the experience without running out of the room screaming or shitting your pants than this is probably the next logical step.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: Swans- Cop/Young God/Greed/Holy Money (1984/1986/1987)

1984, 1985, 1986, 1999; K.422/Young God Records
http://www.swans.pair.com/

"Swans are majestic, beautiful looking creatures. With really ugly temperaments." -Michael Gira

It's hard to come up with a more apt description of the material NYC band Swans released in the '80s. Often sharing the No-Wave scene with Sonic Youth in their young noise terrorist days (it's rumored that Thurston Moore played bass on the first Swans EP) and Lydia Lunch's Teenage Jesus & The Jerks, Swans was about as confrontational and challenging as you could get. As Michael Gira disdained the metalheads that started coming to shows, they would later temper their bleak piledriver assault with cerebral Gothic leanings in the form of Jarboe's melancholic feminine vocals and more refined instrumentation with distinct gospel and folk flavors, but 1984's Cop and Young God EP are an undiluted shot of what made early Swans so great and influential, even if their single-minded depravity left them unpalatable to 99% of the Earth's population.

The very definition of brutal, early Swans' MO was basically an exercise in industrial sludge, a few doomy chords repeated incessantly behind a series of utterly nihilistic and angst-ridden proclamations which left absolutely nothing to the imagination. With song titles like "Cop," (sample lyric: "The punishment fits the crime/Nothing beats humiliation/Humiliation's a disease/Nothing beats them like a cop with a club") "I Crawled" and, most controversial of all, "Raping A Slave," the band laid out themes of domination, despair, and the perversion of power with all the subtlety of a bloody shovel to the head. Listening to Gira's growled mantras and Norman Westburg's slow, tortured guitar is an experience akin to overdosing on barbiturates while sinking into a burning tar pit, helpless to escape. The Marquis de Sade would be proud.

Released a couple short years later and featuring Swans mainstay Jarboe, Greed and Holy Money were a slightly more approachable and refined expansion of the band's artistic palette, but no less determined and harsh for it. "Time Is Money (Bastard)" features a machine-gun rhythm that wouldn't be out of place in an underground S&M club, if the first twenty seconds don't beat every single tooth out of your fucking head. "Coward" opens with the startlingly direct line "I'm a coward/put your knife in me" before pouring on the deliciously painful feedback, and "A Screw" (NSFW!) juxtaposes a thunderous trumpet sample with the usual jackhammering and seriously damaged guitar "solo." However, there are early signs of Swans' later sophistication--"Blackmail" and "You Need Me" are disarmingly pretty vocal showcases from Jarboe accompanied by piano, and the absolutely apocalyptic "A Hanging" with its demonic choir touches on the religious themes they would expand with later recordings.

Reissued in 1999 as a double CD, Cop/Young God/Greed/Holy Money's impact at the time of their release was far reaching--it's hard to imagine Justin Broadrick's Godflesh and their genre classics like Streetcleaner without Swans paving the way, and certainly today's doom metal acts like SunnO))) and Khanate draw heavily on the uncompromisingly dark aura and extended dirges of these early records. After Swans broke up in 1997, Gira went on to form the much lighter, Americana-influenced Angels of Light and Jarboe pursued an avante-garde solo career of her own, but there's been much talk of a reunion. Personally I can't wait. [Update: As of January 2010, Michael Gira has reformed Swans and they are recording new material. I repeat: HOLY SHIT]

Translation:

Enjoy doom metal, or anything remotely minimalist/sludgy? You need this. Now, dammit.

If not, I would highly recommend approaching this after a few Godflesh, Killing Joke and Ministry albums. Some later Swans records wouldn't be a bad idea as well--1995's The Great Annihilator is probably the best place to start.

-SJ

A Token of My Extreme: The Dillinger Escape Plan- Calculating Infinity (1999)

Relapse Records; September 28, 1999
http://www.ireworks.net/

It's hard to believe that NJ noisecore miscreants Dillinger Escape Plan are over ten years old. Now down to only one founding member, guitarist Ben Weinman, their latest album Option Paralysis just hit the shelves about three weeks ago. Having heard it, let me tell you--it's a mild disappointment for people who knew this band when they were deadset on peeling your fucking skull open. It's not really the lineup's fault; Greg Puciato may be a Mike Patton clone, but he's a pretty good one, and it's not like the rest of the band members both new and old are technically deficient. Besides, the band's lineup has always been something of a revolving door since its inception thanks to a mix of piss luck (original bassist Adam Doll suffered a spinal injury in a car accident, for starters), conflicting career paths and the time-honored standby, "creative differences." No, the real problem is that since their best-selling 2004 release Miss Machine, they haven't made up their minds over whether they want to be darlings of the tech-metal set or be popular on MTV, as evidenced by relatively tame excursions into verse-chorus-verse like "Unretrofied" and "Milk Lizard."

Present-day bitching aside I figured it was high time to revisit DEP's first full-length, their benchmark '99 opus Calculating Infinity, the album that really built their reputation as one of the most extreme experiences in underground metal and spawned a host of technically worthy but somehow lacking imitators (Psyopus, Ion Dissonance, Into The Moat etc.).

What does DEP have that they don't? It's the songwriting, stupid.

Yes, believe it or not what sounds like an insane multicar pileup next to a bunch of screaming burn victims is actually meticulously assembled and played with ridiculous prowess, full of maniacally jagged guitar riffs, lashing and abrupt tempo changes and time signatures that are downright fucking inscrutable. As wild as it is, the hardcore punk aesthetic still carries through in the total absence of solos or extraneous wankery--this is a truly efficient brain-splattering machine that has not been replicated before or since. Not even by DEP themselves.

I still consider it a shame that vocalist Dimitri Minakakis stepped out after this album. Sure he doesn't have the versatility of Puciato, but what he lacks in that department he makes up for in unfettered wallpaper-peeling ferocity--his scream manages peaks that are beyond rage, so deranged and caustic that the murderous stream-of-consciousness lyrics he spits aren't even important anymore. When combined with the band's bricks-in-an-F5 tornado assault, the end result is pure whoa. Also noticeable is drummer Chris Pennie, whose metronomic precision and fluency behind the kit are a constant highlight in this polyrhythmic madness. Switching from jazzy cymbal work to brutal blastbeats to breakneck snare rolls and everything in between at the drop of a hat, Pennie deserves his place among metal's elite timekeepers.

Stuttering midtempo slabs of abrasion as in the opening of "43% Burnt" (the album's longest real track at 4:31) last only a few bars before they quickly give way to instrumental passages that sound like tapes stuck on fast-forward before switching again to relatively mellow jazz guitar; and then there's spazzed-out thrash like "Jim Fear" and the pure fucking destruction of "4th Grade Dropout," the climax of which is like being strapped to the front of a bullet train colliding into another bullet train. Every now and again the peaks trail off into hallucinatory, sample-fueled instrumentals like "Weekend Sex Change" which are a welcome comedown from the adrenalized bludgeoning, but they don't last long. Throw in a cryptic and disturbing bonus track, and you have a just about perfect 37-minute showcase of technically proficient ultraviolence for the ADD in all of us.

Translation:

Yeah... this is definitely not for beginners. However, as DEP's mainstream profile has risen in recent years, the aforementioned poppier songs from more recent albums have made it into some adventurous radio formats and similar noisecore bands have become more widespread, Calculating Infinity may not be quite as hard a pill to swallow these days. Barring that I would recommend starting with the excellent Irony Is A Dead Scene EP, which is a superior initiation for the following reasons: 1) Mike Patton is the vocalist on it, 2) it's only about fifteen minutes long and bargain priced, 3) it's not quite as batshit crazy, and 4) see #1.

-SJ