In an effort to emphasize the label’s increasing musical diversity, Projekt  announced a few months back that the label’s ‘shocking new signing’ was  Android Lust, and first up, is a re-release of the album, The Dividing, which was originally released in October of last year.  Over the past few years, the label’s founder Sam Rosenthal has subtly broadened the range of artists that appear on his predominantly Ethereal based record label.  Inking decidedly more Goth rock outfits like Audra and indie/shoegaze acts like Lowsunday and Mira made a great deal of sense at the time but admittedly, Android Lust caused a few folks to raise their eyebrows.  It is one thing to try and show that there is more to Projekt than swirly romanticism and heavenly voices, but Android Lust is an electronic act renowned for uncompromising rawness and feisty feminist aggression.  How would such a band fit alongside Black Tape For A Blue Girl or Lycia?

If there is one thing that Projekt has always managed to do, and I think even the most ardent critics of the label or modern Goth music in general would admit, Sam always provided quality releases that he, as a music fan more so than a businessman, stood behind 100%.  The label has always maintained integrity and even if a few releases were regarded as misses by some fans or critics, there were always twice as many fans in support of those artists as those that were disenchanted with them.  So the point of this long-winded rant is there was obviously something unique about Android Lust that tickled Sam’s ear and earned the band placement on one of the most prestigious labels in dark underground music. "This is something I've wanted on Projekt for many years: a female artist.” Sam confessed in a recent Projekt newsletter. “Not a band fronted by a woman, but a band that -- from the first conceptualization to the last touches on the album cover design -- is completely the creation of one woman. In this regard, Android Lust has a similarity with my music. Except for a gender switch, Android Lust is like black tape for a blue girl: it's one person's vision in every sense."

Android Lust standout among not only the rest of the Projekt roster, but the band differs from most current electronic and Industrial dance bands active in the scene today.  The most obvious difference is of course, Shikhee herself.  While there are many female vocalists out there, most conform to conventional traits of femininity and place a heavy emphasis on angelic vocals that hope to convey a sense of beauty or tranquility.  While many of the cuts on this latest release prove that Shikhee can sing with a subdued and graceful alto, most of the time she delivers a venomous agitated scream that is wrenched straight from her churning stomach.  She has more in league with riot grrls and femme fatales like Lydia Lunch, Jarboe, Diamanda Galas, and Kim Gordon than with wispy overrated sirens.  Which is quite refreshing.  I can’t seem to get enough of irate female musicians.  They put me in my place and remind me how disgraceful it is to be male and how powerless I truly am.  It’s wonderfully subversive.

At any rate, from a musical perspective, there truly aren’t that many unique qualities about Android Lust.  There is nothing groundbreaking in the arrangements of the songs and there aren’t really that many melodic hooks.  But that isn’t necessarily a drawback – I for one am far beyond worn out on smooth predictable electronic music and ready made 120 BPM dance floor hits, and I hope by now, many of our readers are too!  Judging by the overwhelmingly positive response this album received when I hosted a release party for it at Ceremony last month, folks are going to stomp around the dance floor like mad to most of the tracks on this album. The brand of electronic music provided by Android Lust recalls the earlier and more rhythmically jagged days of Industrial dance music.  Atmosphere and emotion are the primary ingredients here, and rightfully so. There is more Skinny Puppy, Frontline Assembly, and early NIN influences present than sugar-coated bounce.  Which I appreciate and enjoyed immeasurably.  The drums have punch, the synths have a stark retro feel to them, and then, of course there are the vocals.

The genuine passion and feverish intensity that animates nearly every vocal performance on this album makes up for any lack of musical originality.  Though the disc opens with a relatively atmospheric and Darkwave instrumental, things really begin to heat up and forge from a misleading sense of safety into delightfully unpleasant territory.  You can tell from the first time Shikhee opens her poison filled mouth on “Kingdom Of One” that she means business.  And it isn’t pretty.  Shikhee is entirely aware that she is off pitch, out of key, out of breath, and for the most part, not even singing.  But somehow, this works.  Vocal purists may scoff, but there is enough out there that follows the same formulas.  There is something dangerous and deliciously decadent about the vocals on this disc and this track in particular.  “Kingdom Of One” is perhaps the most unrelenting track on the disc, and I can imagine it was placed so early on for a reason.

Granted, an entire album of vocals like this probably wouldn’t work, and would alienate more listeners than broaden their minds.  With “Panic Wrought,” we find Shikhee’s rage to be toned down, but unquestionably still damaged and fueled by discontent.  Like some of my favourite Doom metal bands, Android Lust makes misery and suffering infinitely alluring. The painful rasps and whirling gloom of “Follow” trudges even further into Darkwave territory.  A cathartic exercise for both performer and listener, however derivative of other previous musical outfits, the purity is unmistakable.

All in all, to some, Android Lust may seem to be an acquired taste at first. But this album has sinister incubatory powers and it will grow on you.  Once you are used to Shikhee’s unorthodox vocal styles, it’s all smooth sailing from there.  In all actuality, her rasps and freak-outs are very well timed, adding climactic moments to the fluid, sprawling backdrops.  So don’t expect her adrenaline to be pumped to 11 on every track. Shikhee’s singing will more than likely appeal to fans of Tapping The Vein, Collide, and Battery.  But personally, I find Shikhee to be possessed of not only a more colourful punk rock attitude than most female singers in the scene, but she also projects a greater confidence in herself as a performer.

There is diversity in the album, and there is a wide-spectrum of emotional conflict explored, from the gritty explosiveness of “Sex & Mutilation” to the lite trance techno beats of “Unbeliever.” The final track “Burn” is a dreary neo-classical piece that centers on brooding viola and twinkling harpsichords, and if there were any doubts regarding Shikhee’s ability as a vocalist, this track will lay them to rest.  What she ultimately proves is that she is capable of accessibility, but prefers to pursue her own creative instincts, which is quite admirable.

The Dividing is a dynamic, enthralling release, and I am thankful to have had the pleasure to hear it since I missed it the first time around and I am more than curious about Android Lust’s back catalogue.  Hopefully, via the exposure offered by Projekt, Android Lust will reach folks like myself who had wrongfully dismissed Shikhee’s works as just another run of the mill electro project. Definitely recommended.

Track List:
1.) Division
2.) Kingdom Of One
3.) Panic Wrought
4.) Follow
5.) The Want
6.) Stained
7.) Unbeliever
8.) Another Void
9.) Fall To Fragments
10.) Sex And Mutilation
11.) Burn

Android Lust is Shikhee

Android Lust – Official Site:
http://www.androidlust.com

Projekt Records:
http://www.projekt.com

All Living Fear
Home Too Soon (Fear Productions)
~reviewed by UncleNemesis

It's hard to write about All Living Fear without trotting out phrases like 'stalwarts of the UK goth scene' and other such plaudits. It seems like this band has been around for ever, in a bewildering variety of line-ups. In fact, All Living Fear have a ten-year-plus history behind them. They're very much a product of the 1990s 'underground' goth scene which emerged in the UK in the early years of that decade, when the media and music business turned away from goth and forced the scene to go DIY. All Living Fear are one of only a few bands from that period still to be in business now.

Home Too Soon, the band's fourth full-length album, is a bit of a nostalgia-fest for 90s heads in a way, for it features the return of vocalist Andy Racher, who left the band in 1997. Thus all the elements of All Living Fear's early 90s sound are reunited on this new release. If you know the band's older material, here comes the obvious reference point: Home Too Soon essentially continues where the last 'Andy vocals' album, the 1996 release Minimum Resistance left off. However, it's likely that this album will sound entirely fresh to many people today, because anyone who's stumbled upon goth during the last five years may never have heard this particular incarnation of All Living Fear. It was interesting to note that the band's recent performance at the Whitby Gothic Weekend seemed to generate much interest among the younger element of the crowd. Watching the set, it occurred to me that there are probably many people on the current UK scene who've never experienced a guitar-driven gothic rock band going through its paces on stage - not All Living Fear or anybody else. Paradoxically, All Living Fear's rediscovery of their 90s identity is going to sound radically new to many twenty-first century goths, and I dare say there's a whole new audience waiting for them in this area.

Did I mention guitar-driven gothic rock? I do believe I did, and if you're looking for a four-word encapsulation of what All Living Fear do, that's about the size of it. Notwithstanding contributions from others in areas such as songwriting or the live line-ups, what we hear on this album is essentially the work of just two people. Matt North does the music, Andy Racher does the vocals. All the ALF trademark features are present and correct; the overall style of the band has not undergone any radical overhauls. The production has been polished up a bit compared to previous releases, but in creative terms it's very much a case of business as usual. The songs here are familiar-style ALF mid-tempo rockers, with Andy's gothic croon sitting on top of Matt's churning riffs, while Cromwell Knightshade (ALF hold true to the old way of doing things even to the extent of giving their drum machine a name) rattles away in the background.

"Tug Of Love" is an attention-grabbing track, with a load of dirty distortion heaped on the vocals as Andy declaims with a kind of warped pride that he's a 'heartless bastard with nothing to lose'. There's an almost offhand evil in his delivery here, as if he knows he's one of the bad guys and just doesn't care. This is probably the standout track on the album, bringing as it does a little grit and fire to the generally amiable All Living Fear sound. "Excuses" has a neat mid-section where the riff suddenly gets down and dirty as Andy wraps up the chorus with a cynical chuckle. He can assume a bad-guy persona with such ease it's almost scary - and it's noticeable that his lyrics tend to have a bit more of a grime-of-life quality than those written by Martin Johnson, All Living Fear's other lyricist. Andy Racher picks over the grit of human relationships in his songs, while Martin Johnson tends to write in a more metaphorical, abstract manner. Here's an example. "Insomnia", which features one of Martin's lyrics, has a perfectly prosaic subject. It's about...well, not being able to get to sleep. But the words paint an almost mystical picture: 'Surreal rambling through thorny bushes/Grasp the grail, grab the chance for peace/A multitude of swirling voices/A scything tirade that will not cease'. That could almost be a set-piece scene from a Storm Constantine novel, and it's interesting to see how Martin views even the everyday stuff of life in such abstruse terms.

Having said all that, the title track here features an Andy-lyric which gets somewhat more cryptic than usual, although my guess is that he's exorcising some family demons. I'm almost embarrassed to mention that the song contains a word that I'd never met before - I had to make a quick excursion to www.dictionary.com to check it out. As a result I can inform you that 'contabescence' means 'wasting away gradually' - there, now. All Living Fear increase your word power! Musically, this song is almost a ballad, but with a mass of chorused guitars blowing like the wind across the rhythm, giving it a wide-screen feel which works rather well. "Eternal Sin" is unequivocally a ballad, a wistful song driven along with by nice little piano motif. I would've liked to hear this one as a purely acoustic number - the band shovel one of their trademark blat-and-rattle drum tracks over the melody, all programmed flourishes and fills, and I think the song really doesn't need such a busy backing.

That's probably a good point to make of the album as a whole, now I've hit upon it. All Living Fear have always favoured crowded, busy-busy-busy rhythm programming, and almost every song here, regardless of whether it's fast or slow, uptempo or slo-mo, features that chattering drum machine sound, busily whirring away in the background. ALF's rhythm-programming technique seems to involve throwing in rolls and fills and trills of all kinds everywhere there's a nano-second gap. I'm not sure that's such a great idea: a rather more sparse, stripped-down rhythm would surely give the songs a firmer foundation, and create a cool, confident, striding-forward feel, rather than the rush-rush-rush beat-frenzy which tends to overcrowd the ALF rhythm section. "L'Infant De Mort", for example, is a slow-burn number which has been lumbered with a jittery, falling-over-itself drum program which sounds like it's been awkwardly mixed in from an entirely different song. Compare and contrast with Devilish Presley - they use drum patterns almost sparingly, and hardly have a drum roll on an entire album. Meanwhile, All Living Fear's more-is-more approach sometimes manages to squeeze in drum rolls every few bars. Check out "Queen Of Delusion" for another example of a rhythm so loaded with embellishments it makes me feel tired just to listen to it. It seems the band can't allow the slightest rhythmic space to exist without filling it with programmed beats of one sort or another, and there are moments on the album when I want to yell at the CD player, 'Slow down! Back off! Ease up! Less is more!'

Now that I've come to "Queen Of Delusion", let's take a slightly closer glance at that track. I've mentioned that this album more or less represents ALF's return to their 90s incarnation, and it's certainly true that the basic musical building blocks of the ALF sound are much the same now as they were a few years back. Perhaps...a bit too much the same. I've been amusing myself by singing the words to an older ALF song, "Each And Every Way" over "Queen Of Delusion". You can swap lines from song to song and they fit exactly. These words from "Queen Of Delusion": 'I followed my nose and it led me astray/The favours I granted nearly broke me that day' can be replaced directly by these lines from "Each And Every Way": 'I treated you bad when I should have been good/I took you for granted, didn't play by the book'. Maybe Andy's familiar habit of pitching a line of vocal fairly low, then going up a bit for the next line, then down again, then up, and so on, as if he's on a vocal see-saw, contributes to the heard-it-before feel, but then again - count the syllables in the two lyrical excerpts I've quoted - you can tell that both songs have as near as dammit the same structure. Well, I suppose it's not surprising that a long-established band which relies for its musical input on just one person should begin to repeat itself after many years and several albums. As a matter of fact, Inkubus Sukkubus, who operate in a very similar fashion to All Living Fear, have been fending off exactly that criticism for some time now. And I suppose you could say that if the old fans don't mind, and the new fans don't know, then who cares if the same basic musical ideas come back for an encore in several different songs? But for me, this kind of stuff rings warning bells.

So, this album is All Living Fear's trip back to the old school, and for the most part it's a good experience. Older fans of the band can pick up where they left off in the mid-90s, while for new fans this album will doubtless come as a welcome departure from much of the stuff around on today's scene. But there are one or two instances here where the band sound like they're bumping up against their own limitations, and rehashing some rather over-familiar musical designs which they first brought to the party a good few years back. I suppose you could say that this album represents a calling card dropped onto the mat, just to alert the world that All Living Fear are back - but I think it'll be the *next* album which will indicate whether the band have enough ideas-fuel in their tank to power them into the twenty-first century.

The tunestack:
The Nearly Man
Queen Of Delusion
Tug Of Love
Excuses
L' Infant De Mort
Insomnia
D>D>N>X>
Home Too Soon
Eternal Sin
Forgive And Forget

The players:
Matthew North: Guitar, bass, programming
Andy Racher: Vocals & lyrics
Martin Johnson: Backing vocals & lyrics
Cromwell Knigfhtshade: drums

The website: http://www.alllivingfear.co.uk

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis:  http://www.nemesis.to

Anima Nera
Anima Nera
~reviewed by Joel Steudler

Any band that gives me an excuse to use a derivative of the word 'eponymous' wins a few points from me, and with their eponymously(!) named debut album, Anima Nera certainly qualifies. These newcomers to the US metal scene pack a decidedly European punch, having chosen to imitate their contemporaries from the frozen Scandanavian tundras. They pilfer stylings from melodic deathmetal and black metal while chipping in some thrash of their own and come up with an exciting though mostly predictable hybrid.

Meritorious riffing abounds, with heavy slabs of gripping guitar flying by right and left on nearly every track. Nothing I haven't heard before countless times, but at least the execution is good and the melodies are catchy and full of variety. Anima Nera also has a softer side, though, as displayed by a number of acoustic guitar interludes that break up the mayhem. The songs are well composed and don't usually linger in any particular place too long. It's a shame, then, that the production is on the 'crappily raw' side. After listening to a release like Grimfist's Ghouls of Grandeur, it is apparent that superb production does not destroy aggressiveness... a lesson I hope Anima Nera learns, as their music deserves better.

The music also deserves better than the vocals as they are currently presented. A variety of approaches show up across the album, the most prevalent of which is a black metal screech-rasp. The vocalist doesn't really pull the style off convincingly though, and sounds like a strangled muppet who's really really angry. But then that could describe most black metal vocals, so take it however you will. The fellow that delivers the deathmetal blurty growling vocals fares better, sounding more like a nasty monster than a constricted imp. There's also some clean shouting here and there, but it's not enough to get upset over.

So, then, I have a few complaints with Anima Nera. The rasper needs to go to Norway and get beat up or freeze in an ice cave or whatever the vocalists there do to get their voices properly set. Maybe he hasn't burned enough churches down yet, I don't know. The lead guitarist might want to occasionally tune his instrument, too. Other than that, you have an album here that has many fine riffs, contains songs that keep interest levels high with varied structure, and applies plenty of musical violence in accordance with the union guidelines. It's nothing revolutionary, but then what revolution only costs $10 (at The End's store)? It might be worth your money.

Track List:
01.) Beneath These Skies
02.) Somber Eyes
03.) A Lesson Learned
04.) At The Feet of the Wicked
05.) Flatline
06.) The Ashes of Innocence
07.) Infected
08.) My Razorblade Romance

Anima Nera is:
Daniel Bott
Jacob Depolitte
Kelly Prime
Jason Morris
James Tony Hayden

Stereo Recording Co.:
http://www.stereorecordingco.com

The End Records (US):
http://www.theendrecords.com/
 

Apocalypse Theatre
Zombie Street
Whispers Of The Tribe
~reviewed by UncleNemesis

Apocalypse Theatre (or Apox, to their friends) are, it seems, an itinerant bunch of punky-gothy-industrialish reprobates who have been perambulating around the US scene for ten years or so. They bill themselves as more of a travelling art concept than a band, and, although they've had innumerable line-up changes over the years, the central figure is apparently someone called V. Mercy (who looks, incongruously enough, somewhat like Valor out of that well-known doomcookie-metal band, Christian Death). The band has put out three or four conventional music CDs; they are now part of Martin Atkins' Invisible empire, but the video-CDs I'm reviewing here seem to be independent releases.

Before we proceed, a disclaimer. If I seem a little vague here it's because Apocalypse Theatre don't make it easy to zero in on basic facts. Their website is stuffed with many thousands of words, ranging from erudite dissertations on the state of underground culture, to entertaining, if rather vague, histories of the band. There are grand, broad-brush statements of intent, and quasi-mystical rants - not least in a journal by V. Mercy himself, in which we can read his 'dark thoughts'. As a matter of fact, going by the continual re-appearance of the same typos, grammatical errors, and spelling glitches throughout the website, not to mention the same melodramatic 'It's us against the world!' feel to much of the writing, I suspect he's responsible for everything on it. If the Apox website itself is not enough, you can read yet more of V. Mercy's valedictory dramatics on the United Voice Livejournal, along with other bands on the Underground/Invisible label rosters. All the relevant links, by the way, are given below.

Trouble is, fascinating as V. Mercy's manic outpourings are (in a kind of slow-down-to-watch-the-car-crash manner), they're not much help when you're simply trying to find out some nuts-and-bolts stuff about Apocalypse Theatre. The bare essentials - like a discography, or even the names of the people in the band - just don't seem to be there. Perhaps, in Apocalypse Theatre's world, names just aren't important. They claim to have had over 75 members. I suppose, when your personnel turnover reaches that kind of frequency, you don't even bother to ask anyone's name. Yep, that's right - over 75 members have passed through this band. These guys must've had a lot of bizarre gardening accidents.

So, feeling rather baffled, I turn to the two video CDs. These come to us from a mysterious organisation called Primal Tek, which is, I gather, some sort of underground arts 'n' media collective, which incorporates some, but not necessarily all, the members of Apocalypse Theatre. So, these video CDs are essentially self-released items....sort of. With me so far? Right. Let's press play.

Zombie Street is, as if you couldn't guess, a home-movie style video in which members of Apocalypse Theatre and sundry friends play a bunch of goths (not, it must be said, roles that are likely to stretch anyone's acting range) who go to a party and get turned into zombies. That's about it for plot: having established the premise, the video then comprises assorted zombified goths lurching about, falling over the furniture and each other. Curiously, beyond a certain smudginess of make-up and jerkiness of walk, the zombie-goths all seem reassuringly normal. When they start battering at the door, trying to get into the house, they just look like a slightly over-enthusiastic bunch of trick-or-treaters. Frankly, I've seen more hideous sights at closing time in the Devonshire Arms. Everyone in the video seems to be having a fine old time, and here, I think, we have the crux of it. Without a proper story, or a structured script which pushes everything to some sort of conclusion - without, in short, a *point* - I suspect Zombie Street was more fun to make than it is to watch. A good old fart-about for the protagonists; a briefly amusing, but ultimately rather purposeless, piece of fluff for the rest of us.

Also on this CD is a video of Apocalypse Theatre's song 'Parasite'. This is a mash-up of clips from the Zombie Street video, footage of fire-artists of various kinds, live shots, and V. Mercy himself, who, by the miracle of digital effects, floats alarmingly in mid-screen while he declaims, in a gutteral monotone, the kind of lyrics that Nosferatu would probably reject for being too foolishly melodramatic:

'Disintegration in my head
No salvation for the wicked things that we have done
My hell is your hell so welcome home
My pain is your pain so can you smell
The stench of decay and what is left of our human remains'

After hearing the spooky-synthpop track, I confess I wasn't particularly keen to hear more Apox music - I mean, after all this hype, if all they do is *synthpop*, then include me out. However, the CD also includes some MP3 tracks, some taken from the soundtrack of the film, and featuring other bands, some by Apocalypse Theatre themselves. The Apox tracks demonstrate that there's more to the band's music than they've allowed us to hear thus far. Of particular note is 'Desert Song', an acoustic, tumbleweed-rolling-across-the-wasteland ballad, and something credited to 'Harbingers. Apox. Underground', a baffling random-word-association title for a slice of deep, dark, bad-trip hop which actually works rather well. Then there's the cover of U2's 'I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For', re-invented as a nightmare rock opera, complete with a loping beat and a collection of wailing harpies on vocals. All of which is intriguing, but, in true Apox style, it's all presented in the most confusing way possible, without clear artist/title credits.

Fortunately, the second CD, Whispers Of The Tribe, lives up to the hype a bit more. Among the various features, we find an extended advert for the band in which the by now familiar mish-mash of video clips (circus performers, fire dancers, live shots) illustrates a voice-over, treated for spooky effect, in which V. Mercy (for I assume it is he) makes yet more grand statements about the intentions and philosophy of the band. Ooh, he does like his grand statements, does dear old V, there's no doubt about that. Elsewhere, there's a 'Gallery & Stories' section which - hurrah! - actually namechecks some of the past and present members of the band. Well, I'm glad we got there in the end, but shouldn't this basic info be readily available on the Apox website - not tucked away as an additional feature on a video release?

Whispers Of The Tribe itself turns out to be Apocalypse Theatre's first attempt at a 'proper' film. Not just a bit of fun with a video camera and a bunch of mates, this one actually has a story, a script, characters, dialogue, flashbacks, all that real-deal stuff. In a nutshell, it's all about a girl who has strange dreams, hears whispers in her head, goes a bit loopy, and gets chased by frightening zombie-like goths. Hmm, maybe Apox haven't progressed quite as far with their film-making ideas as I'd assumed. But it's a fully-realised project in the way that Zombie Street is not, so, to that extent, we've moved on. The one rather jarring note is the over-use of effects: it's all done in a very slick manner, but Apox's inability to get through a scene without editing in dancing monsters, nuclear explosions, or employing slo-mo or speeded up sequences, random colour changes, or turning everything to negative, soon becomes carpet-chewingly frustrating. After a while, I find myself shouting at the screen, 'OK! OK! We get the point! You know how to do all the fancy FX stuff! Now for God's sake give it a rest and just tell the story!' I suspect it's V. Mercy himself on the virtual editing desk - the everything-including-the-kitchen-sink approach to the post-production seems entirely consistent with his generally rather OTT approach to his band in general. Methinks the man needs to chill.

There are also some audio MP3s, which allow me to hear more of the Apox sound in all its glory. This time round, I fear I can give you no song titles at all, because when I went looking for them (yep, you've guessed it, the band hide this information away, rather than slapping it up on the virtual front page, or otherwise making it *accessible*) my entire computer froze up. Well, bugger that for a game of soldiers. No song titles, then. But I *can* give you an overview of the three songs here. Think of Hole. Now think of Hole going techno-metal. Now think of every distorted-chant industrial band you've ever heard. With Lene Lovitch on guest vocals. Put all that into a blender, and that's what you hear.

So, after all that, what do I think of Apocalypse Theatre? I like their ruthless independence, and their willingness to dip a toe or two into any pool of creative endeavour. They can obviously make all the techie stuff stand up and dance, and some of their music is intriguing and cool. But, for all that, they can be an infuriating bunch. The ideas behind both their music and their movies veer wildly between the genuinely creative and the crashingly obvious. V.Mercy's constant grandstanding, his absurdly manic dissertations on life, the band, and everything, grow rather tiresome after a while. The utter lack of any simple, straightforward, accessible, one-stop source of information on the band is just plain idiotic - I've spent far too much time scrolling up and down web-pages, or clicking through the obscure recesses of the CDs, just to find the kind of basic details which most bands would slap up on their websites as a matter of course. And even then, I've frequently drawn a blank, or discovered info so cryptic and confused it tells me nothing useful.

I think Apocalypse Theatre has got some good stuff here, but it lacks structure and focus. They're a random match thrown into a box of fireworks, when they'd be so much more effective as a guided missile. It's probably nothing that a manager, a webmaster, and a scriptwriter couldn't fix. Given that Apocalypse Theatre seem ever-willing to accept new people into their collective, if you feel like applying for any of those positions, by all means get in there. A certain skill in herding cats might be an advantage. But don't tell 'em Uncle Nemesis sent you!

The Primal Tek website: http://www.primaltek.org

An older Apocalypse Theatre website, now out of date: http://www.angelfire.com/band/apocalypsetheatre

Download Apocalypse Theatre videos from this site: http://www.thediseased.com

The United Voice Livejournal - a forum in which bands on the Invisible and Underground, Inc. labels post tour news, on-the-road updates, and general musings on life. V. Mercy of Apocalypse Theatre is a regular contributor: http://www.livejournal.com/users/ourunderground

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis:  http://www.nemesis.to

Arcane Art
KritaRan
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

KritaRan is the most boring CD I've heard in a long time. If you don't like droning, highly repetitive dark ambient rock-ish music that's sometimes not really even music, then you won't like Arcane Art's bizarre sound manipulations and experimentation. On the other hand, if you're a fan of artistic experiments and aren't looking for music with diversity (ie, you enjoy styles that you aren't supposed to constantly attend to), then you may just like Arcane Art.

I'm half-tempted to quit the review right there, because this band is really sort of difficult to describe. Their sound is rooted in a form of ambient rock, partially improvised and partially planned, where strange overused guitar effects weave in and out of the soundscape over looping drum rhythms, distorted bass, and other synthetic sound creations. At any given moment, the music is really quite nice. The band creates an atmosphere of empty sadness, or a sort of hollow darkness.

However, after minutes upon minutes of the same riff and beats... it tries my patience. I like ambient and experimental music insofar as it has progressions or alterations to the sound, even subtle ones. Arcane Art essentially play very subdued electronic ambient with rock instrumentation. Ulver's ambient music adroitly captures variation in a minimalistic context, whereas IDM artists such as Upland, Aphex Twin and Plaid use ambient sounds to craft powerful atmospherics.

Arcane Art, comparatively, does none of these things. The experience is roughly like listening to a 54-minute introduction to some larger work. It would function well enough as part of a recording, but fleshed out into a complete CD it is severely lacking in depth and variation. If you want an unobtrusive rock-ish ambience, then Arcane Art has a good sound. But for the vast majority of us, 54 minutes of that same sound with only minor variations is utterly dull and uninspired.

Track List:
1) Chapter I
2) Chapter II
3) Chapter III
4) Chapter IV
5) Chapter V
6) Chapter VI
7) Chapter VII
 
Arcane Art is:
Bernt Edvard Egeland - drums, percussion, guitar, programming
Karsten Hamre - sound effects, sound manipulation and samples

Arcane Art - Official Site:
http://www.neokunst.com/arcaneart

Dragon Flight Recordings:
http://www.dragonflightrec.org/

Alien Sex Fiend
Information Overload (13th Moon)
~reviewed by Uncle Nemesis

At the risk of boring you with blatherings from yesteryear - me and Alien Sex Fiend, we go back.

Alien Sex Fiend were, of course, one of the original 'Batcave bands' - one of that select group of weird-art loonies who made their initial name via some appropriately manic performances at the original Batcave club in London at the turn of the 80s. But their real success came a little later, when they struck out onto the UK live circuit. I particularly recall a stonker of a gig at the Electric Ballroom in London in 1984, where the Fiends played with Bone Orchard, Inca Babies, and Sunglasses After Dark - just about as cutting-edge a line-up as you could get at the time. The Fiends' own set was post-punk gone postal: a crazily surreal spectacle of cartoon-horror imagery, ludicrous props and gimmicks, and, in the centre of it all, Nik Fiend himself, fixing the audience with a mad, bad, stare, roaring and hollering like a preacher from another planet. Later in '84, I saw Alien Sex Fiend again, at the Fridge in Brixton - the original club, which was no more than a room above a shop, all painted white, with old refrigerators piled up around the room like an arctic scrap yard. Alien Sex Fiend were in their element in this surreal setting, and exploded onto the Fridge's small stage like a carelessly discarded hand grenade. I've still got a flyer for that gig somewhere - printed on greaseproof paper. Fridge, geddit? Oh, we were all so conceptual in those days.

But it wasn't just the manic, loopy stage shows that made Alien Sex Fiend's name. Beneath all the horrorshow larking about, they were a genuinely innovative band, one of the first to mash up guitars and electronics. At a time when simply using a drum machine was considered pretty darn radical, the Fiends would construct entire songs around towering, shuddering synth riffs, and then layer bloops and bleeps and electronic stomach noises over the top. The Fiends were using
samples back when they were called 'cut-ups' and 'found sounds'. Then they'd drop a crashing slab-o-guitar over the whole caboodle, Nik Fiend would start his mad ranting, and the whole damn thing would *rock*. It's my firm belief that Alien Sex Fiend were hugely influential in this area, more so than anyone's ever acknowledged. Try this simple test. Play 'Dead and Buried' by Alien Sex Fiend, 'Uberman' by Sheep On Drugs, and 'Firestarter' by The Prodigy back to back and you won't need Burke's Peerage to trace the lineage. Alien Sex Fiend were innovators and originators. They *started* all that!

I was, therefore, rather disappointed to find, as the 80s rolled into the 90s, that Alien Sex Fiend seemed to coast to a gentle halt. They stopped touring, the flow of new releases became a trickle (at precisely the time that the flow of re-releases became a flood) and the band more or less took up residence in the 'Where Are They Now?' file. Occasional Fiend-sightings rang alarm bells. I recall an interview with Mr and Mrs Fiend in Lowlife fanzine sometime in the 90s, where their responses to questions about current music seemed vague and evasive. They implied enthusiasm for the dance scene, but couldn't name any particular favourite artists. They seemed to like the idea of dance culture, without particularly knowing much about it. Only two new Fiend-releases came our way during this decade: the computer game soundtrack 'Inferno' and the 'Nocturnal Emissions' album, both of which hinted at a stripped-down, slowed-down, dance scene-wannabe Fiends, making blandly functional trance-dance for ravers on a come-down. Frankly, it seemed to me that the Fiends had driven their rocket up their own arses. The music wasn't innovative any more - other artists had taken the Fiends' early ideas, and by the 90s were pushing those ideas further than the Fiends themselves could manage. The watershed moment, I think, came in 1993 when Sheep On Drugs released their genuinely groundbreaking first album. All of a sudden Alien Sex Fiend started to look like an old jalopy puttering along in the slow lane, while newer, sleeker, faster models streaked past - with Fiend-fuel in their tanks.

Still, I showed faith. When I became a promoter in 1995, I approached Alien Sex Fiend's management with a view to dragging the band out of semi-retirement and putting them back on a stage. The response was cautiously favourable, but the idea foundered on the Fiends' insistence on a four-figure fee and a large theatre venue such as the Astoria before they'd deign to tread the boards again. After such a long time off the circuit, I thought this was pushing things a bit. I was thinking more in terms of a three-figure fee and a medium-size club venue like the Underworld, just to see if the band could still command an audience. We could move up to bigger venues (and more money) *after* the band had proved themselves, not before! Well, suffice to say that the gig never happened. Alien Sex Fiend didn't play live again until '97, by which time the 'Nocturnal Emissions' album was out. Jason of Caged Bat Promotions recruited the band to headline a small-scale goth festival in Nottingham. Presumably, by this time, the Fiends had dropped their Spinal Tap-esque negotiating position, because they ended up playing the 500-capacity Rig club - exactly the sort of gig they wouldn't play for me! Notwithstanding a strong support line up, the gig wasn't a sell-out, which backed up my doubts about the band's pulling power. I felt vindicated. I also felt disappointed by the band's performance, which was pedestrian and bland compared to their earlier incarnation. Nik Fiend literally strolled through the set. He simply wandered around the stage, chatting out his lyrics without exerting much effort, and without even particularly acknowledging the presence of the audience. I felt quite relieved that I had not ended up promoting the band - if they'd done a set like that for me, I would've asked for my money back!

Jason Caged Bat obviously had more faith in the band than I could muster. Later in '97 he put them on in London, at the Electric Ballroom, a venue which had all sorts of old-skool resonances for those of us who'd been there in the early days. But the Fiends' insistence on portraying themselves as part of the dance scene raised its head again. Jason's original selections for the support slots - The Marionettes and Die Laughing, as I recall - were unceremoniously bumped off the bill because the Friends didn't want to play with goth bands. They insisted on their own choices of supports, and thus it was that we endured the anonymous trancey meanderings of Pod and Killa Instinct, two faceless dance acts whom I'd never heard of before - and I've never heard of 'em since, either! But that, it seemed, was the company Alien Sex Fiend wanted to keep.

Now, given my earlier remarks regarding the Fiends' influence on such rock/dance crossover artists as Sheep On Drugs and The Prodigy, I would certainly never diss the band for wanting to extend their feelers in the direction of the dance crowd. An obvious crossover audience existed in this area in the 90s, which Alien Sex Fiend could've claimed for their own - if only they'd been a bit more sussed about it; if only they'd had a bit more scene-level knowledge. If only they'd kept on pushing forward, instead of dropping out of sight for several years, and then coming back re-invented as a dance act inside their own heads, but without anything like the appropriate audience, and without any real idea of how to handle the slightly delicate crossover manouevre. Potentially, it was all there for them, but frankly I think they blew it.

So, here we are, five years on from all that, and slightly to my surprise a new Alien Sex Fiend album has arrived. I'm surprised because I was under the vague impression that the band had split up - or, at any rate, had coasted to a complete stop, unremarked by anyone. But it seems Alien Sex Fiend do still exist, albeit in a sort of half-life as Mr and Mrs Fiend's occasional studio project. Five years between releases - yes, I think we can justifiably use the word 'occasional', don't you? I'm not quite sure if we can justifiably describe this album as 'new', though: a glance at the archive section of the Alien Sex Fiend website reveals announcements relating to the recording and release of the album going back to 1999 - and one track, a cover of The Doors' 'Five To One', was actually released on a compilation back in 2000. This, I suppose, illustrates how slowly Alien Sex Fiend move these days. Even their new material is several years old. No wonder they can't seem to grasp the zeitgeist.

'Information Overload', then, can perhaps be described as more of a compilation of relatively old Fiend-emissions, rather than a genuinely new album - and there are certainly moments here which sound...well, a bit nineties. But let's take it from the top.

The first noise we hear is the curiously retro sound of a modem dialling up - the Fiends, it seems, don't have broadband. This introduces the title track, which is all about, erm, the internet, and how there's lots and lots of information available at our fingertips these days via this astonishing new invention. This, of course, hardly counts as a stop-you-in-your-tracks revelation. Indeed, given that the internet is now such a mundane part of everyday life it's rather odd that the Fiends should be so gobsmacked by something that the rest of us have been calmly taking in our stride for quite a few years now. Nik Fiend, adopting a comedy-cockney voice, rasps out some frankly rather obvious observations about the virtual world as if he's only just stumbled upon the world wide web: 'The world gets smaller wiv communication...suffering from an information overload there's a loss of transmission...' Loss of transmission? Hmm, maybe his modem hung up unexpectedly. All this takes place over a vintage, shuddering Fiend-sequence which recalls 'Ignore The Machine' - are the Fiends being post-modern here, and sampling themselves? The track has some engaging moments, particularly the chanted chorus: 'Rape and pillage in the global village!', but overall it has a bizarrely old-fashioned feel. Let me shoot straight from the shoulder here: after five years of Fiend-radio silence I expected something a little more sharply contemporary than a retro-styled dissertation on commonplace domestic technology.

Fortunately, things pick up a bit with 'Motherfucker Burn', nine minutes and one second of bubbling, distorted, ambient-psychedelic-rock-dub-reggae over which Nik Fiend freaks and shrieks thus: 'All for some, some for all/Beat your head against the wall!' The track has a cool, loping  groove to it, somewhat in the same rhythmic area as such 90s indie-dub-dance heads as Dreadzone - but then great chunks of gated, reverbed, guitar come crashing in like tidal waves, pushing everything into the red, whereupon the track recalls the kind of stuff The Young Gods used to do. If you're a DJ, try this one segued with 'TV Sky' - I reckon it would work. Ah, yes, this is more like it - I can hear the influences at work, but at least Alien Sex Fiend seem to have some fire in their bellies again.

'Baby' is another reggae-fied groove, very much in the area of Adrian Sherwood's On-U Sound excursions. It even has the down-in-the-mix vocal snippets that are an On-U Sound trademark, and washes of fuzzed-out guitar which recall Skip McDonald's work with Dub Syndicate. Nice stuff, actually, although my ultimate thought as the track draws to a close is that I really should give Dub Syndicate's album 'Classic Selection Volume One' a spin. Now there's a seminal work of left-field reggae - as I suspect Alien Sex Fiend would agree, since they appear to have done their own take on it here.

'Drug Of Choice' is a little squib of samples, a fourteen-second interlude, and then we're into 'Gotta Have It' which has yet more of those Young Gods gated guitars, so much so that If you'd told me this was a remix of 'Gasoline Man' I would've believed you. The track thunders along on a whumping beat and staccato guitar-bursts, without much in the way of vocals - unless you count chopped-up bits of Nik Fiend yelling 'Have it! Make it mine! All For Me! Fuckers!' beneath several layers of distortion. Again, I like what the Fiends are doing here, but my appreciation is tempered by the knowledge that someone else has done this stuff before - and I've got the original take on this sound in my vinyl collection, filed under 'Y'. Ultimately, this track sounds like an extended remix of someone else's idea, and that really isn't what I want to find myself thinking. Whatever happened to the days when Alien Sex Fiend were out on their *own* limb?

Next, there's a pointless four second sound effect which the Fiends have rather pretentiously dignified as a track in its own right - it's entitled 'Lord Of The Sexual Matrix', no less. A more realistic title would be 'Bumping up the track listing without bothering to write any real music'. The next proper track is 'Kiss Arse', which  has a ludicrously long intro which sounds like Nik Fiend farting about with an echo box, but ultimately unfurls into an extended workout of dub tricks and guitar effects. None of this ever really resolves into a *song* as such: in fact, there's nothing like a conventional song on this entire album. This, in case you're wondering, counts as a *good* thing - where does it say that Alien Sex Fiend should follow conventional songwriting rules anyway? However, having said that, this track does rather come across as a bit of self-indulgence in the studio. It just rumbles along without much in the way of tension and resolution - without, in fact, much of a point. I think they needed at least two more ideas in there to make it work.

'Voices In My Head' slinks along on all manner of spooky/ambient effects, like an out-take from a horror movie soundtrack, and as such is probably the nearest thing to old-skool Alien Sex Fiend you'll find here. And then the album wraps up with that three year old cover of The Doors' 'Five To One', which clocks in at five minutes and nine seconds. Surely Alien Sex Fiend missed a trick there - why not time the track to come in at 5.21? It's a good old stompy late-nineties industrial-techno workout, which sounds curiously dated at this distance - think Ultraviolence, Revolting Cocks, that kind of musical area. I can imagine this track going down a storm on the Slimelight dance floor a few years back, but now it's a weirdly retro experience.

And that's it - there is no more. The first Alien Sex Fiend album for five years - and, I confess, there's a certain 'Is that it?' feeling in my head as the final moments of the final track fade away. In truth, there are only four tracks here which have any real substance to them: 'Information Overload', 'Motherfucker Burn', 'Baby', and 'Gotta Have It' - and each of these draws heavily on obvious 90s-scene influences, except for 'Information Overload', where the Fiends seem to be drawing on old-skool Alien Sex Fiend influences. There are moments where it all works well, moments of real dynamism where that essential crazed Alien Sex Fiend spirit comes through - but there's too much here that's just a bit underwhelming, especially after a five-year wait. In the end, I get the impression that Alien Sex Fiend are too isolated, too out of touch for comfort, moving too slowly in a high-speed world. They need fresh ideas; maybe they need to work with contemporary musicians and producers. What the hell, maybe they just need to get out more.

I'm glad to find that the band still exists, because a world without Alien Sex Fiend in it would be a sad and sorry place. But, dammit, I wanted *more* than they give us here.

The players:
Nik Fiend - Vocals, guitar, scratching
Mrs Fiend - Keyboards, beats, bass, samples

With:
Slice - Guitars
Gonzo 'Dave' Dearnley - Guitars

The Fiendsite: http://www.asf-13thmoon.demon.co.uk

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis: http://www.nemesis.to

Ásmegin (Norway)
Hin Vordende Sod & Sø
~reviewed by Joel Steudler

I love Norway, because it is full of crazy musicians. Perhaps they are considered normal over there, in that frozen funland, but from my lofty perch in the realm of darkness and woe (America) they sure look nuts. Ásmegin is full of lunatics who make crazily good viking folk metal (the genre itself somewhat of an insane incongruity). Hin Vordende Sod & Sø will twist your head in a knot and bewilder you with its constant changes in direction and tone, but will also delight and amaze you with its musicianship and creativity.

Ásmegin employ a dazzling array of real folk instruments (along with real people who play them really well) that mix in with the metal-band portion of their sound seamlessly. Each song is so densely packed with layers of instruments both ancient and modern that you could spend a few hours just trying to sort them all out. The truly amazing thing is that the inclusion of so many disparate sounds never feels forced or out of place. The band darts from somber and quiet fiddle fueled folk tunes to accordion laced romps ala Fintroll, then again on to bludgeoning viking deathmetal all within a few skipped heartbeats.

Vocally, things are no less unpredictable. Seemingly dozens of singers wandered through the studio while Hin Vordende Sod & Sø was being put together. Crazed witches, blackmetal raspers, lilting forest elves, sandpaper throated growlers and serene chanters all show up at one time or another... and often all at once. Everything and anything goes when it comes to the vocal direction across the album's eleven tracks. The chaos is carefully orchestrated, brilliantly staged, and though manic in pace is never incomprehensible. Anyone who gets bored listening to this album can probably vibrate through walls. Far more likely is succumbing to sensory overload, but Ásmegin has arranged and paced everything so deftly that the music is never overwhelming, but always engaging, like an expertly designed amusement park ride.

I recommend this album to everyone who likes metal. Only hard hearted jackasses or teenagers who hate everything will come away from Hin Vordende Sod & Sø disappointed. It is an artistic triumph and an ass kicking album full of catchy brutal riffs and stunning beauty. All of the musicians involved are of the highest caliber. The album trumpets everything that Norway and its neighbors have offered to the genre of metal and then some. Where other bands like Fintroll, Borknagar, Ulver (in their metal days) and Vintersorg all seemed to have a few pieces of the puzzle, Ásmegin assembles them into a brilliant and complete picture of the best of modern Scandanavian metal.

Track List:
01.) Af Helvegum
02.) Bruderov Paa Hagstadtun
03.) Huldradans Hin Gronnkledde
04.) Til Rondefolkets Herskab
05.) Aver Agirs Vidstragte Sletter
06.) Slit Livets Baand
07.) Efterbyrden
08.) Op Af Bisterlitiernet
09.) Vargr I Veum
10.) Blodhevn
11.) Valgalder

Ásmegin is:
Marius Olaussen - Guitars, keyboards, vocals
Raymond Håkenrud - Guitars
Tomas Torgersbråten - Bass
Tommy Brandt - Drums

Additional Musicians:
Lars Nedland - Vocals
Anja Hegge Thorsen - Jew's harp
Oddrun Hegge - Norwegian zither
Lars F. Frøislie - Piano, mellotron, keyboards
Sareeta - Fiddle, vocals
Anne Marie Hveding - Vocals
Børge Finstad - Percussion
Gunhild Førland - Country flutes
Nikolai Brandt - Vocals

Ásmegin - official site:
http://www.asmegin.com/

Napalm Records:
http://www.napalmrecords.com
 

BELBORN
Belborn and 3 DREI THREE
~reviewed by Goat

On the opening page of the Belborn website, one finds the following message:
"BELBORN was brought into being by Holger F. and Susanne H.!  We present melancholic and heroic music with German lyrics.  The ideal accompaniment for all who live awake and prepare the way to a GOLDEN AGE!"

Belborn are now Holger F., Susanne H., and the smallest Belborn, Skadi-Lilja.  I love the idea that this music comes from, and reflects the spirit of, all three of them; a family. So much of what is supposed to be "folk" music these days actually includes very little of the folks who make it; not so with Belborn. This is very powerfully emotive music, music which appeals to the spirit and to the soul on a very honest and open level.  It recalls a lost romantic age; an age of heroism and bravery, or, as Holger has said in an interview, of, "Trust, honesty, pride, honour, love of the homeland, individuality, paganism!"  One cannot help but be touched by the honesty of this music; the simplicity of it, both musically and lyrically.  The music is mostly guitar, with some 80s synth influences, and two people singing their hearts.  The first CD, "Belborn" is definitely the more (dare I say?) 80s influenced of the two CDs, since the keyboards are more often felt, but the overall atmosphere of the CDs remains decidedly folkish, regardless. The keyboards, guitar, and vocals create a warm, organic sound rather than the more industrially disconnected sound associated with most keyboard-driven 80s bands.

Another thing I appreciate about the Belborn CDs is that, with the exception of one song, every song is sung in German.  I enjoy hearing CDs from European countries that are sung in their native tongue and do not sing in English just because it might sell more CDs, or because an English audience demands it. I feel it reflects a great laziness on the part of the English-speaking listener when there is whining that there are not enough songs in English.  Certainly an American band would balk if Japanese fans kept pushing for songs to be sung in Japanese!  So, I also respect Belborn for the fact that they do not change themselves just to reach an English audience.  They do include lyrical  translations in English, and I find it enjoyable to
follow along and learn some German words on the way.

Lastly, the graphics on these CDs are exquisite.  Many of the graphics are drawings by Holger, and some are photographs, or graphics from old copperplate engravings.  The entire presentation of the CDs, the graphics, the lyrics, the music, it all reflects a great care and tenderness for the art; it is beyond refreshing.  If the CDs were only the music, it would be enough, but what a grand thing to hold two discs so delicately  and carefully crafted; with so much thought put into them, and so much of the minds and hearts of the artists who dreamt the dreams that became the art.  CDs of this quality are rare.

Distribution of both the "Belborn" and "3 DREI THREE" CDs is through WorldSerpent.  http://www.worldserpent.com

*Stateside readers can find Belborn CDs and vinyls through the usual WorldSerpent distributors such as:
http://www.middlepillar.com
http://www.soleilmoon.com

Visit the Belborn website for photos, interviews, discography and more:
http://www.belborn.de/index.html

Perhaps to fully appreciate folk music, one must also know a little about the country of the folk.  Here are some sites about Bavarian Rosenheim, from whence Belborn hail:
http://www.thefunkes.de/interest/rosenheim.html
http://www.airport-shuttle-munich.com/rosenhus.htm
 

Betray My Trust
A Million Miles from Everything
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

A Million Miles from Everything is a half-hour EP from Maryland's Betray My Trust. The music falls into the realm of 'popular gothic rock that isn't popular'. By that I refer to the genre of gothic rock that is by no means goth, but is nevertheless a more depressing take on popularly accepted radio rock sounds (see: Katatonia, Anathema, et al). The general feel on this EP is that of sadness, and the extended instrumental sections beautifully capture both haunting and surprisingly uplifting passages (reminiscent of Agalloch). Excepting these moments, the music largely focuses on the singer, who laments about the standard things musicians tend to be down about.

Unfortunately, the singing lacks the emotional power of groups such as Opeth and Katatonia. Betray My Trust will not depress or move you in any significant regard, it will simply sing about depressing or moving subjects for you to do with what you choose. This difference in approach is not a flaw (and I'm not criticizing the group), but it is an important mention for metal fans. A Million Miles from Everything does not present the metal aesthetic that Katatonia manages even in their friendliest rock songs.

Instead, Betray My Trust is reaching into that same pool of musical creativity that all the aforementioned bands do, except they're dipping in as a rock band while the others approach the sound from a metal background. The distinction is subtle - but it implies two key things: 1) Metal fans who only appreciate bits and pieces of gothic rock won't get into this EP; and 2) Rock fans who like a lot of mildly depressing rock probably will.

The six songs on A Million Miles from Everything are just a little on the rough side in terms of composition and execution, but really, Betray My Trust shows a lot of promise for becoming an important gothic rock band in the vein of Katatonia. The singing style feels a bit too 'rock' to fully engage me. To use a crude comparison, the basic vocal sound reminds me of the Goo Goo Dolls, but used to a more depressing end. So, essentially, if you dabble in listening to this style of music from a firmly rooted metal standpoint, you're best off sticking to the known greats, but if you enjoy a lot of rock and wish it were more dejected without being lugubrious like that awful showy theatrical metal stuff, give Betray My Trust a listen.

Track List:
1) Intro
2) I Love You, But Goodbye
3) The Saddest Year
4) Letting You Go
5) A Million Miles From Everything
6) The Bridge

Betray My Trust - Official Site:
http://www.betraymytrust.com/

Black Funeral
Belial Arisen
~reviewed by Goat

Black Funeral, nee Sorath, nee Abaddon, have released what is probably the death knell of any band.  The "old and unreleased" material; this following the release by a formerly "black metal" band of an "experi- mental/electronic" album, and then, the imperative move to Texas, as if proximity to Averse Sefira will help.  Perhaps so. Time will tell.

I'd say this release is probably for posterity only; for fans of the band whose cassettes are wearing thin, or who want this material on a cd with artwork rather than just mp3.  It's fairly mundane black metal;  nothing to get your asbestos knickers in a wad about.  The press material compares this release with the work of Emperor, Bathory, and Mayhem, which is laughable at best.  Of course, it can be argued that this is an American black metal band, which explains why the mediocrity is acceptable, compared to the Nordic masters. No American band has really *ever* held a black candle to any of them, I don't care what the Texas converts say.

Again, if one is a fan of the band, one will definitely want this release to round out the ol' collection. Otherwise, get something by any one of the other bands mentioned in this review.

Track List:
-Infernal Majesty
-Book of Belial
-Antichrist Rising
-Varcolaci
-Lycanthropy and Flames
-Light of Satanael
-The Crimson Dragon

Behemoth Productions/ Masterpiece Distribution
http://www.behemothproductions.cjb.net
http://www.masterpiecedistribution.com

Babylon Mystery Orchestra
Divine Right of Kings
~reviewed by Joel Steudler

I can tell you right now that if you're reading this site by choice (and aren't being forced by a squad of well armed goths to peruse our pages), you will find nothing of interest in this wretched example of Christian-agenda-driven tripe. Move along, nothing to see here... unless you enjoy it when reviewers bash bands who make garbage. Personally, I sort of get a kick out of that kind of thing, so I'd probably keep on reading this. That might just be me. I'm kind of odd. On to the trashening: Babylon Mystery Orchestra is neither mysterious nor particularly orchestral. Additionally, I bet its sole member, Sidney Allen Johnson, hasn't even -been- to Babylon. That, however, is neither here nor there. I wish this album was neither here nor there... but I digress. Again.

My main bone of contention with Divine Right of Kings is that musically, it is of very, very poor quality. The songs are exceedingly simplistic, childish concoctions that plod along at a snail's pace. Before you think 'oh, doom metal!' ... it's not. Think 'sedative laced classic metal' that has no drive, no power, and no compelling reason for ninety nine percent of metal fans to listen to. Mr. Johnson also seems to have cribbed his riffs and slow-mo solos from the 'Metal for Morons: The Worst of the 80's!' handbook, and plays what seems like a humorless caricature of all the cheesiest old metal cliches. Making matters even worse, ol' Sidney's singing voice is akin to that of an uncommonly deep-voiced muppet. His sleepy delivery borders on 'comical' but usually lands in 'intolerable' when he veers from singing into spoken word segments. Even Reverend Lovejoy from 'the Simpsons' is cooler as he preaches from the pulpit than Sidney is as he spews out his fundamentalist screeds.

Those selfsame screeds, in fact, are what push Divine Right of Kings over the edge from harmless crap into offensive trash. In true fundamentalist Christian fashion, Sid seems to feel we're all going to hell. Shooting down the fast track to Hades, according to the Sidster, are homosexuals and black people who complain about injustices done to their ancestors. The track 'It's My Right' tells the tale of Little Suzy in her schoolroom suffering moral outrage as her classmate Little Johnny tells a tale of 'a kid with two mommies'. Then another student, Little Willie is given an 'A' by his teacher while 'trying to shakedown the crowd' with tales of the injustices done to slaves, as he says he's 'owed money to help his people cope'. While the song mainly appears to be an indictment of the educational system, it can't be construed as anything other than an attack on homosexuals and blacks. Way to go, Sid. Keep thumpin' that Bible... right up against your fat head, preferrably. Maybe it will knock some of the sensless intolerance and hate out of there. Or just put you in a coma. It's a win-win proposition. The rest of the lyrics are of the 'mostly inoffensive but right-leaning' variety, worthless in their hollow platitudes.

As much as I've derided all the Satan-lovin' black/death metal bands out there in previous reviews, I can do no less when evaluating Babylon Mystery Orchestra. Both the satanic and fundamentalist christian viewpoints share an extremist and negative worldview that serves no purpose other than to incite hatred. Is that what we really need? Sometimes I tolerate all the satanic nonsense since it is often coupled with fine metal music, and typically seems so over-the-top that the calls for baby eating and indiscriminate slaughter seem ridiculous and cartoonish. In my estimation, Mr. Johnson actually believes the message he seeks to deliver on Divine Right of Kings, and there is no excellent music to back it up. I therefore have nothing at all to recommend about this worthless album, which I hope sells little enough that Mr. Johnson is dissuaded from ever picking up his guitar again.

Track List:
01.) A Habitation Of Devils
02.) We Are Power
03.) Road To Madness
04.) Whore
05.) It's My Right
06.) Savages With Cash
07.) Save My Soul
08.) Evado Eversor
09.) Mourning Glory
10.) Divine Justice
11.) Crestfallen

Babylon Mystery Orchestra is:
Sidney Allen Johnson

Babylon Mystery Orchestra Official Homepage:
http://www.babylonmysteryorchestra.com/

We Are Childhood Equals
This is what you asked for
~reveiwed by Basim Usmani

 Okay, I confess, I never quite understood the mass appeal of bands like Smashing Pumpkins or Sonic Youth. I knew they played around with interesting song ideas, but they never wrung me about by the throat the way this does. What we have in This is what you asked for is the culmination of the swirling Indie sound; it never meanders and it always hits you right in the chest. This is one of the most violently dynamic bands I have heard in recent years. They have an arsenal of songs that lure you in with a rhythm worth lusting after while a seething melody suddenly swoops in to ambush you. You’ll be left with the ruins of your former self after listening to this, and the songs will take on a life of their own upon further listens. The intimacy between the bass and drums is unbelievably tight; I wonder how long they’ve played together…

When they lock in together near the end of Veranda, they create an exothermic reaction within your upper body the way warm cider does. The frothing 8th-note guitar strut is delightfully volcanic between verses in "Sunday She said I was Sick". "City Mimicry" is the easiest to consume, but it will dissolve in your mind much more rapidly than the others will. The other four tracks are far more spicy, and if you give them the attention they deserve, they’ll prove to be much more filling. I urge fans of all music to take cues from the masterminds behind We Are Childhood Equals, who once again show us that good songs aren’t about posing or showcasing. Good songs take you somewhere. I urge you to buckle up.

Track List:
1.) City Mimicry
2.) Veranda
3.) Sunday She Said I Was Sick
4.) N Judah
5.) This Is What You Asked For

We Are Childhood Equals is:
Peter – guitar, vocals
Michael – guitar, vocals
Melanie – bass
Phil – drums

Official Website:
http://www.childhoodequals.com

Pop Faction Records:
http://www.popfaction.com
http://www.popfaction.com/
 

cEvin Key
The Dragon Experience
~reviewed by Jyri Glynn

There is hardly an industrial act around who can’t claim some influence from the music of Skinny Puppy and its founding members.  Equally, enthusiasts of the band’s music have over two decades of cEvin Key’s own music to follow.

A quick overview begins with cEvin Key’s musical launch of electro-pop band, Images of Vogue.  Most notably he was one of founding member of Skinny Puppy and also released two albums with fellow bandmate, Dwayne Goettel under the name Doubting Thomas.  Key teaming up with Bill Leeb (aka Wilhelm Schroeder) from Front Line Assembly/Delerium on release Cyberaktif and with the Legendary Pink Dots’ Edward Ka-Spel to create the Tear Garden.

During the turbulent last rites of Skinny Puppy, Key and Goettel created a series of exploratory works under the name of Download.  After Goettel’s premature death, Key continued working with avant-garde stylings, which can be heard on consequent Download recordings, as well as his Plateau side project.  In conclusion Key releases his third solo album with The Dragon Experience.

If I were to draw a reference point for those familiar with Key’s numerous earlier releases and projects, I would catalog The Dragon Experience somewhere between the Remission/Bites era of Skinny Puppy’s music and Key’s own Doubting Thomas project.

Though the majority of the tracks on The Dragon Experience were written and composed nearly twenty years ago (between 1984-1985) the music is nowhere near dated.   Anyone familiar with industrial music knows that Skinny Puppy and its members were always a bid ahead of their time and with cEvin Key’s latest release this fact is once again reaffirmed.

For the final treatments of Dragon Experience, Key joined up with Ken Marshall, though how much contribution Marshall has to this album is a bit of an unknown.  The music has a contemporary feel to it, which leads me to believe both Marshall and Key did do a bit of tweaking with the original mid-80’s recording.

Much of the archival release resembles an instrumental score for a horror movie yet still maintains a refreshing blend of electronica and danceable drum loops.  Samples are fluid through out the album ranging from mysterious voices and screams to the precise sounds of a knife blade being sharpened.

A great deal of the album reminded me so much of earlier material from Skinny Puppy that I found myself half expecting Oghr’s growling vocals to punch in at any moment.

This is a must buy album for any admirer of early Skinny Puppy’s work or simply those looking for great electronic-based tunes.

cEvin Key: http://www.subconsciousstudios.com/
Metropolis Records: http://www.metropolis-records.com/

The Cramps
Fiends Of Dope Island (Vengeance)
~reviewed by Uncle Nemesis

I'm very envious of The Cramps. It must be so cool to be able to live your entire life like you're starring in your very own B-movie; to construct your own world of chrome and leather, high heels and tail fins. That's The Cramps' great achievement: they're trash icons, prophets from planet rock 'n' roll. We can't all live our lives like The Cramps, but once in a while they'll put out an album and invite us to their party.

I've lost count of the number of albums The Cramps have released to date, and I certainly can't remember how many different line-ups they've had over the years, so don't expect any erudite contextualising or scene-setting with this one. I'll simply predict that Fiends Of Dope Island will go down in Cramps-history as a bit of a classic. It's got more fire and energy than we have any right to expect after all this time, more wit, humour and gung-ho spirit than most bands can muster in an entire career. The Cramps fuel themselves up with all the enthusiasm and glee of a brand new band, and plunge into a set of classic Cramp-o-rama that's easily as good as anything they've ever done.

You know you're in for a rollercoaster ride when the very first song on the album is entitled 'Big Black Witchcraft Rock' - and yes, it most certainly lives up to its name, with Lux Interior hog callin' the lyrics over one of those magnificent rock 'n' roll bashabouts that The Cramps always do so well. Poison Ivy's guitar grinds and churns, unceremoniously rough 'n' ready on the big bad riff. It's a song which steps right up and dares you to suggest that The Cramps' bellies are any less full of fire than they used to be. And then there's the utterly wonderful 'Doctor Fucker', a song which I suspect exists purely to allow Lux Interior to have some fun with the rhythm of those two words.The whole thing is soaked, nay, marinated in so much reverb that 'Doctor' and 'Fucker' crash into each other like particles in an accelerator as Lux gets loose on the chorus. It's a mad and marvellous stomper with some great voodoo drums thrown in along the way. And the good Doctor's final piece of advice? 'Take two weeks' worth of drugs/And call me in the morning'. Don't try that at home, kids. Oh, all right, go on then.

'She's Got Balls' is a warped love song, a hymn of praise to 'Miss Mascara Monster' who's 'Thin as piss on a plate/And high as the sky above'. A very fine companion song to 'Big Balls' by AC/DC, if any DJ is brave enough to try it, I'd suggest. And then we meet the 'Mojo Man From Mars', inventor of a strangely addictive dance which will getcha any time of day: 'It's too early for the bars/And I done wrecked both the cars' sings Lux, helpless in the grip of the Mojo Man's compulsion and convulsions. The lyrics on this album are as gloriously funny and surreal as ever. Rather unfairly, you'll seldom see The Cramps given any credit as lyricists, but they've always had the uncanny ability to set up a weird, wired world in just a few words; they can take us to another place and have us dancing and laughing within a couple of verses and a crazed chorus. It's a rare skill, and there are plenty of instances of that skill at work here.

But if I was to name one song as my favourite, it would be 'Elvis Fuckin' Christ'. Now, there's something about that title that kind of clues you in to the fact that this isn't a nice little ballad, right? It's a dangerously insane romp, a grand proclamation of undiluted rock 'n' roll attitude, with Lux roaring and railing against the 'Big rock awards' on TV, which have apparently 'Crowned a brand new king'. And, of course, it should've been him, because he's 'Chicken pluckin', go-goo muckin', Elvis fuckin' Christ!' The entire song is an insane, assertive anthem, a steaming, fire-breathing theme song, a statement of intent, The Cramps unceremoniously planting their black flag right in the front yard of anyone who thinks Nickelback is as good as it gets. All this and a harmonica blasting away like a train. What what more could you want?

So, it's time to get a little attitude in your life. It's time to fire up the hot rod and get down to The Cramps' virtual drive-in. Neck those funny green pills, turn it up loud, and spend a while with the Fiends Of Dope Island. I'll guarantee the party will be a blast.

Oh, and a postscript. Just in case you were still in any doubt about The Cramps' warped, genius wit, I note with great delight that Lux Interior and Poison Ivy's songs are published by 'Hiss And Hearse Publishing'. Now tell me you don't love 'em!
 

The tunestack:

Big Black Witchcraft Rock
Papa Satan Sang Louie
Hang Up
Fissure Of Rolando
Doctor Fucker M.D.
Dopefiend Boogie
Taboo
Elvis Fucking Christ
She's Got Balls
Oowee Baby
Mojo Man From Mars
Color Me Black
Wrong Way Ticket

The players:

Lux Interior: Vocals, harmonica, maracas
Poison Ivy: Guitar, theremin
Chopper Franklin: Bass, rhythm guitar
Harry Drumdini: Drums
 

The Cramps don't have an official website, but these fan sites contain the essential stuff:

http://members.shaw.ca/thecramps/index.html

http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/Club/6803/main.html

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis: http://www.nemesis.to

The Creatures (UK)
Hai! (Sioux Records)
~reviewed by Uncle Nemesis

I am officially seething with jealousy here. In the sleeve notes which accompany this album, Budgie remarks that while he was in Japan for the recording sessions which eventually became Hai!, he went out for dinner with eX-Girl. Being a huge fan of those surreal art-punks myself, I would've sold my granny for such an excursion - although I can't help wondering what was on the menu. Frogs' legs, perhaps?

Yes, Japan. That's where much of this album was recorded, and there's a bit of a story to be told here. It seems that in Tokyo last year, during the Banshees' reunion tour, Budgie took a day out to record some percussion improvisations with Leonard Eto, a leading exponent of the art of Taiko drumming. These sessions, essentially a few hours' worth of spontaneous drum-jamming between two musicians who'd never even met before, form the basis of this album, and as you might imagine there's a heady sense of 'anything goes' running through much of the music. It's not simply an improv-sesh, though - further recordings, including Siouxsie's vocals, were added at The Creatures' home studio in France. The end result is a set of tightly structured rhythm-and-atmosphere workouts which owe virtually nothing to conventional rock 'n' roll, but which will capture the hearts and feet of anyone with a rhythmic bone in their body.

In a sense, these recordings mark something of a return to the original Creatures concept, inasmuch as the band originally comprised just Budgie's rhythms and Siouxsie's voice, although the drum tracks here have a richness and depth that the earlier recordings never quite achieved. What's certainly obvious is that the latter-day 'full line-up' version of The Creatures, the band which made the 'Anima Animus' album and subsequent stuff, has been well and truly kicked into the long grass here - and that perhaps illustrates the principal difference between The Creatures and the Banshees. The Creatures can do anything they like; there is no blueprint, no rule book, no expectations on the part of the fans beyond the knowledge that the *next* thing The Creatures do will quite possibly be utterly different to the *last* thing they did. After 20-odd years in the Banshees, that freedom must be a heady brew for both Siouxsie and Budgie, and I'm sure that's why there's a sense of gleeful abandon in much of the music here. There are even little touches of humour in Siouxsie's lyrics, particularly 'Godzilla!', which, as you might infer from the title, isn't exactly an excursion into the land of the po-faced. 'Godzilla! He trashes cars/Godzilla! He's not from Mars!' she sings, in a lyric which sounds so gloriously daft you'd think she'd been hanging out with eX-Girl. Hmm, come to think of it...

I suppose there will be people out there for whom the odd tangents of The Creatures just won't work. This album, which is absolutely not 'rock music' of any stripe, will probably fall on stony ground for all those people who used to go down the front at Banshees gigs and wail for 'Love In A Void'. But if you can keep up with Siouxsie and Budgie's ongoing, eclectic, quest for the new and the bizarrely cool, their willingness to jump into any musical pool which presents itself, they're an intriguing and rewarding band to follow. Here, they give us the opportunity to come with them on their latest excursion, and it's a journey I'm happy to make.

The tunestack:
Say Yes!
Around The World
Seven Tears
Godzilla!
Imagoro
Tourniquet
Further Nearer
City Island
Tantara!

The players:
Siouxsie Sioux: Words, vocal melodies & arrangements
Budgie: Drum kit, marimba, piano, yueh ch'in, percussion, synthetics
Leonard Eto: Taiko drums
Hoppy Kamiyama: Chaos tapes

The website: http://www.thecreatures.com

Leonard Eto: http://members.jcom.home.ne.jp/chappagogo/index.htm

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis:  http://www.nemesis.to
 

Defleshed
Royal Straight Flesh
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

The subtitle to Royal Straight Flesh is "battle hymns in eleven acts..." The CD proudly displays sweaty old men in battle gear, riding horses, and pointing their menacing spears while charging onward. The rest of the CD booklet revels in gory decapitations and battle scenes that look kind of neat, if you're into that sort of thing. The song lyrics, however, talk about car engines: "To tuning up my engine / is all I can imagine / To me there's nothing that feels / like the burning of my wheels."

On the one hand they're trying to create a violent fantasy death metal image, but on the other hand they sing about nukes and machine guns. Royal Straight Flesh is kind of like a modern interpretation of an old classic, as if they'd stumbled across many real battle hymns and conformed them to the necessary modern equivalents. As an experiment, I can appreciate that, but the sepia-toned drawings of ancient battles don't exactly mesh with motor engines and burning wheels.

Defleshed's music sounds kind of like a heavy death metal version of rock songs about fast cars and blowing things up. The riffs are thrashy and fast, the drums rapid as hell, and the vocals are manic and aggressive growls. Each time I listen to this CD, I get into it for the first couple of songs. And then, as far as I can tell, the same basic ideas repeat for the rest of the 11 songs, inspiring a humdrum reaction because I learned all of the band's tricks in the first four minutes of this 32 minute album.

I'd feel remiss if I didn't at least admit that Defleshed play good metal, but the general incongruency of their themes and the never-ending fast tempo makes Royal Straight Flesh into a blurry mess that is hardly a mandatory purchase. If you can't get enough of fast driving heavy music, then you could do much worse than checking out Defleshed. They get a good sound going, it's just too bad that once they establish it across the first two songs, you won't hear anything else.

Track List:
1) Hand over Fist
2) Fire in the Soul
3) Friction
4) Warborn
5) Feed on the Fallen
6) Royal Straight Flesh
7) Back for the Attack
8) Blood Brigade
9) Pick your Poison
10) Dangerous when Dead
11) Brakefailure

Defleshed is:
Mathias Modin - drums
Gustaf Jorde - vocals and bass
Lars Lofven - guitars

Defleshed - Official Site:
http://www.defleshed.com/

Regain Records:
http://www.regainrecords.com/

The End Records (US):
http://www.theendrecords.com/

Destination: Oblivion
Thirteen Beginnings to the End
~reviewed by Kristina Rogers

Okay so I have to admit when I first started listening to this CD I was a little worried. I mean when a band starts off its album singing its own band name over and over... sure, it's bold... it beats the name recognition into you. It also makes you go "so what's this? Eminem? Kriss-Kross? Wham!?" And weren't we treated to quite a bit of that by the artist formerly known as "My name is Prince and I am funky?" "Maybe...," I thought, "this is a KMFDM side project" (yes, it's true, some darker bands too are known for singing about themselves). So yeah, I was worried. But not for long.

All joking aside, a minute or two into the first track it became pretty clear that Destination: Oblivion is a talent. And not just your run-of-the-mill, one-sided repetitive synthpop talent. They are diverse. They incorporate the heavy, crunching guitars that the electro-industrial scene has been lacking (and screaming for!) these past few years. They pull back with some subtle, more reflective melodic tracks, and then delve head-first into dirty, grungy guitar-driven mayhem once again. They incorporate simple, yet insightful (and somewhat humorous) lyrics. They aren't afraid to pay tribute to their influences - and when I say influences, I'm guessing Navratil & Co. listened to a bit of NIN in their day? And they aren't afraid to rock.

The lengths of the tracks as well as the moods they convey are extremely varied on this disc, which provides the listener some refreshing variety. The second track, "The Flow," for example, is a brief, 2-minute romp of unadulterated guitar-driven industrial beats, that flow somehow seamlessly into the atmospheric, down-tempo melancholy of "Waiting for the Storm," punctuated by eerily lull of piano keys. Track 4, "Desensitize," more than adequately showcases the band's Metal edge, while songs such as "Last Stop" hint at Destination: Oblivion's more melodic capabilities.

There are quite a few tracks on this disc and it's honestly difficult to keep them all straight the way they all spill over into the next (whether that's a drawback or not depends on the listener). Tracks 6-8 are welded together in such a way that they play out as sort of a 3-part epic - whether or not this was the band's intent. Track 6, "Shell," comes on strong and doesn't pull its guitar-heavy feedback-laden punch for a minute before fading effortlessly into the slower-paced, swampy angst of the 11-minute, "Buried", which is an epic in itself that toward its end features my favorite lyrics clip of the CD: "A society of hate... breeds... a society of hate... breeds... a society of hate..." You get the picture. Not reinventing the lyrical wheel of course, but a cool quip nonetheless. The end of "Buried" soon becomes obscured by the beginning of "Tendencies," a pleasant and appetizing composition of hatching maggots, decaying corpses and shit-circling flies, which you probably wouldn't want to play for your mom.

"Claiming Victim" is probably the most obviously Nine Inch Nails influenced track here (and I'm talking early NIN). Understated in its simplicity, "Claiming Victim," at its core, is not much more than a simple piano tune over a deep droning bass, accented by the breathy vocals of a singer who's obviously got a bone to pick with someone. The simplicity may have something to do with why I like it, but I'm quite sure the lyrics did. I couldn't help cracking a smile or two at "They'll all die in their ignorance. They'll all die in their stupid fucking ignorance..." I mean shit how many times a day do you look around at the world and can't help but think THAT... someone should've put it to music sooner. Or maybe it's just me...

Probably my favorite song on the CD is "Our God Greed." It's catchy as hell and probably the most likely club hit this CD's gonna have if it has one at all. I was a little disappointed by the total loss of momentum around the 4th minute, after which the song abruptly switches gears and becomes 4 minutes of some experimental/noise endeavor - but who cares, that's what editing's for. I loved the incorporation of "We can't close our eyes all night. We may wake up changed." from Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Nice touch.

All in all, I think this is an incredibly strong debut effort, which doesn't sound amateur in the least. I think Destination: Oblivion has some room for improvement, but then what band doesn't? The vocals at times come off a bit dispassionate and "recited," but it certainly doesn't detract from the overall triumph of this album. I'm hoping that "Thirteen Beginnings to the End" doesn't suggest that Track 13 is the end for this up and coming Portland-based act, because I'm looking forward to hearing what they come up with next. And in the meantime, I'd highly recommend that industrial-metal fans get out there and buy this one for their collection. I'd even suggest paying full-price.

Tracks:
1. destination
2. the flow
3. waiting for the storm
4. desensitize
5. lies
6. shell
7. buried
8. tendencies
9. claiming victim
10. our god greed
11. hope
12. last stop
13. wormhole

Artist Website:
http://www.DestinationOblivion.net

Devilish Presley
Disgraceland (November 10th)
~reviewed by Uncle Nemesis

Back in the mid-80s, there was a cowpunk band from...oh, Oregon or somewhere, called Elvis Hitler. They had an alterno-scene hit with a lunatic psychobilly trucking song entitled ‘Ten Wheels For Jesus’, which you’ll find on their classic album Disgraceland. That’s if you can find anything at all by the band at this distance, of course. I imagine they split up long ago. But I mention all this because Devilish Presley seem to be channeling that same irreverent gung-ho spirit of rock ‘n’ roll - not to mention the same punning references to Elvis-related matters. Devilish Presley’s album title, of course, is exactly the same as Elvis Hitler’s, and it was this odd coincidence which first made me sit up and take notice of the band.

Devilish Presley don’t come from Oregon, or even anywhere in the USA.  They’re based in the East End of London, although you’d never guess this from their music. They’ve deliberately set out to create a sound which places them on the never ending freeway of rock ‘n’ roll, any year - no, make that *every* year - between 1955 and 1977. You can hear plenty of classic rock ‘n’ roll influences in their sound. Even the names of the two people in the band, Jacqui Vixen and Johnny Navarro, sound like characters from a Jerry Lee Lewis song. The big, fat glam-rock guitar sound of Ian Hunter and Mick Ronson is reflected in Johnny Navarro’s own playing, and the whole caboodle is thrown together with a healthy dose of punk rock attitude. While we’re trawling for influences, let’s mention the vocals:
Jacqui Vixen has the most splendid I-won’t-do-my-homework howl I’ve heard since I last played ‘The Best Of The Runaways’, while Johnnny Navarro wrenches out his vocals in a querulous yet aggressive tenor which, at times, sounds bizarrely like the style of Brian Molko. In fact, if you’d told me that ‘She’s Not America’, with its taut guitar and splenetic vocals, was a long-lost Placebo song, perhaps from around the same time as ‘Nancy Boy’, I’d have believed you.

I don’t mean to turn this review into a never-ending list of comparisons, but you can certainly hear Devilish Presley’s influences and inspirations churning away in their own racket. Fortunately, they *do* have their own racket. They’ve brewed up a noise which is all their own, regardless of where they’ve got the ingredients from. This is a stripped-down take on ye olde rock ‘n’ roll, no unnecessary frills or luxury trimmings, a collection of rally-spec rockers rather than softly-sprung boulevard cruisers. It’s worth pointing up the fact that Devilish Presley are strictly a two-piece band, with a drum machine where a drummer would normally be. Too often, that’s a recipe for weedy beats and over-programmed busy-busy ticky-tocky rhythms, like overwound clockwork toys whirring away in the background. Ah, but not here. Devilish Presley’s drum tracks are uncompromisingly minimal - there’s hardly a drum roll on the entire album - and every beat thwacks good and hard.

Standout tracks? Well, I keep on returning to the aforementioned ‘She’s Not America’, a song which drives forward with such bug-eyed aggression it’s impossible not to get swept along. ‘Saturday Night Satellite’ has the baddest riff since Danielle Dax’s ‘Cat House’, and Jacqui sounds frankly scary on this one. ‘Gonna Find What’s Shakin” effortlessly lives up to its classic rock title - I swear that’s one of Chuck Berry’s guitar riffs in there. The whole thing has such a gloriously old-skool kickabout feel to it that when the lyrics reach the line, ‘Hey baby, the text message read...’ I can’t stop myself from laughing at the crazily incongruous mash-up of modern references and vintage rock ‘n’ roll influences. Somehow, Devilish Presley make it all work.

The full-speed-ahead approach is relaxed for a handful of slowies - ‘Alien Turf’ is a weirdly psychedelic bout of alienation (‘I’ve got the Neil Armstrong blues...’) while ‘Pin Cushion Girl’ is a ballad of doomed love which still manages to be utterly rock even though it’s an entirely acoustic song. ‘Little Red Schoolhouse’, a title typical of Devilish Presley in that it reeks of down-home Americana, turns out to be a song about the suicide of someone called Gavin - a name so un-rock ‘n’ roll that I have to conclude that it’s a true story. I’m sure that if the song was fictitious Devilish Presley would’ve thought up a more rockin’ name (Hank?  Clint? Elvis? Dave?).

I strongly suspect that if you cut Johnny Navarro and Jacqui Vixen in half you’d find they had ‘Gonzoid’ written through them like two sticks of Blackpool’s finest. They’ve certainly made an album which comes roaring out of the traps like a crazed hound of rock ‘n’ roll. I believe you can only obtain the album at Devilish Presley gigs, or via the band’s website. But it’s worth tracking down, just to invite a little freaked-out, rocked-up, glam-punk madness into your life.

The players:
Jacqui Vixen: Vocals, bass
Johnny Navarro:  Vocals, guitar

Devilish Presley’s website:  http://www.devilishpresley.com

A brief interview with the band on the rockin’ Tower Hamlets council site:
http://www.towerhamlets.gov.uk/templates/news/detail.cfm?newsid=1561

An Elvis Hitler website (mostly dead, but at least it proves I’m not making this stuff up!): http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/Hotel/1198

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis:  http://www.nemesis.to

Drawn and Quartered
Extermination Revelry
~reviewed by Goat

[Finally.  Death metal cooler than the t-shirt.]

Ahhhhhh, the churning buzzsaw of guitars; the insane thunder and pulse of a much-more-than-proficient drummer; the interplay of high-hat sound and guitar, skimming along over each other without regard for eardrum or faint heart.  Wondrous.  Oh, and production by James Murphy.  I don't even think I need to say more!

But, in case I do, here's more:
The vocals and music here are beautiful gore.  Having just seen Nile recently, I can attest that what Drawn and Quartered are doing right now equal, if not totally surpassing Nile at this point in history.  I say this not to downplay Nile, because they kicked posterior region; I say this to give you some idea of the power and the fury behind Extermination Revelry.  This is absolutely *revelry*.  I can imagine watching the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre to this.  Any Fulci film, anything just sick and brutal and vile, this music would be a thrill to hear while watching. If you're really tired of the same old stuff over and over with death metal, Drawn and Quartered just might surprise you.  Think early Sepultura meets Incantation.  I mean, this is really good stuff; very much worth your money and your time, and damn, when they tour, SEE THEM!

Track Listing:
-Embrace of Darkness
-Incinerated Faithful
-The Ovens Await
-Kill For My Master
-Necrophile Decapitator
-Worshippers of Total Death
-Sodomized and Butchered
-Under the Chainsaw
-Abyss Behind My Gaze
-Show No Mercy (US-only bonus track.)

Moribund Records
http://www.moribundcult.com

Edge of Sanity
Crimson II
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

Crimson II is the excitingly titled follow-up to Edge of Sanity's classic Crimson, a record I never had a chance to hear (though I'm assured that its luminescent brilliance is matched only by the beauty of stars... or er... a flaming forest doused in napalm, if you're looking for a more "metal" analogy). My opinion of Crimson II is entirely dependent on which part of the CD I happen to be listening to at the time. There are moments of inspired genius, but they're marred by stretches of uneventful tedium.

Say what you will about Dan Swanö, but the man is no slouch. Swanö (Sweden), Hellhammer (Norway) and Mortiz Neuner (Austria), form an unstoppable triumvirate of Scandinavian drummers that relentlessly appear on their country mates' CDs. Swanö is also noticeable for being an excellent metal guitarist/vocalist, and for possessing an even more superb clean singing voice. He brings his vast metal experiences together on Crimson II, forging a sprawling, continuous song broken into nine movements and 44 tracks.

Yet a number of the riffs on Crimson II are, frankly, dull. They sound like In Flames used to - creating that sort of heavy but pleasantly listenable melodic metal. Still other riffs are so energetic or unusual that you can't help but get sucked into their swirling vortex of manly might (now there's a metal analogy). To break the typical Swedish melodic death metal mold (growly vocals/melodic riffs), there are plenty of interesting interludes with fun proggy solos, ambient guitar, synth orchestration, and Swanö's amazing clean voice. Many of the melodic themes are repeated throughout the work, creating a real sense of fluidity for what is basically one long ass 43-minute song.

Sadly, the moments of generic growling and riffing keep Crimson II from grabbing me as thoroughly as I'd hoped. The production is also lacking slightly, particularly due to the wishy wash splash of the cymbals (this may have been intentional... but to what effect I can't fathom). Nevertheless, Dan Swanö is an eminent metal musician that would be hard-pressed to create a worthless CD. Crimson II is more than worth your time if you like the melodic death metal style. If you're too jaded to even think about this kind of music, know that Crimson II has an abnormal ambition and epicness that makes it listenable regardless, and this is definitely the kind of work that can grow on you.

Track List:
I - The forbidden worlds
II - Incantation
III - Passage of time
IV - The silent threat
V - Achilles Heel
VI - Covenant of souls
VII - Face to face
VIII - Disintegration
IX - Aftermath

Edge of Sanity is:
Dan Swanö - guitars, bass, drums, keyboards, vocals

with special guests:
Roger Johansson - lead growling vocals
Jonas Granvik - backing growls
Mike Wead - lead guitar
Simon Johansson - lead guitar

Edge of Sanity - Official Site:
http://www.metalprovider.com/eos/

Black Mark:
http://www.blackmark.net/

The End Records (US):
http://www.theendrecords.com/
 

Electric Press Kit
Show Me
~reviewed by Mick Mercer

Many years ago, when a lot of you were still unable to read or write, or even take solid foods, the Punk scene gave way to a brief experimental period which showed that hundreds of bands wanted to also do what the punks had done, and fulfil their musical destiny. This wasn't the commercial New Wave army, but the birth of the Indie scene, and during times like these, maybe it's natural that people are going back to more artistic ways to express themselves.

EPK describe themselves as Noise Coldwave, inspired by Industrial acts, and that's fair enough, for here there are loose-limbed creations, like mutant experiments, where just the husk of an idea is quite enough to propel them forwards for a few feisty, musty minutes in a way which doesn't seem common, or even current, and therefore holds you with its spell. An ugly enchantment much of the time, but also quite exciting.

First let me tell you that they have developed. As well as this basic seven track CD, I received a one track CD which contained the song 'Les Secrets Suspendus', that was cinematic, like a drowsy, blurred Tricky, with synths fluttering prettily and juicy beats, where the occasional intrusion from the bounding drum machine was fantastically inspiring. Tunes like this need a long stretch for a slight gap and dragback to work effectively and they have the discipline necessary to make that work successfully. It's mood music for when your mood is slightly mental. (But for God's sake do better artwork. You can barely work out the song titles or url!!!!)

On this album, which is presumably slightly earlier work, they conjure up a few ghosts, mainly from the early Factory days (people like Section 25 and Crawling Chaos) as well as This Heat or Cabaret Voltaire, where people are using the simplest of instruments and grappling techniques to wring sense of instruments they don't have great mastery of. The bass is particularly dismal and holds them back. The singing is talking, more or less, with snarled, heavily accented English. This all adds to their allure, somehow.

At times their energy, their determination burns through the brittle tunes, in a way most bands won't understand. I sense in this the same thing I did back in the day, when bands believed anything was possible and didn't care if it wasn't. This ties in beautifully with what I was trying to impart the other day and punk and fanzine mentality, where we refused to accept second best, which is a total contrast to current UK Goth bands who, with a few exceptions, don't really believe they're good enough to succeed, on every level, and therefore aren't.

The title track is really just a racket, with some deep anguish in its innards, but the clatter and rumbling of 'Not Very Funny' are oddly stark. Disembodied, scrambled, and somehow close to what Crass might sound like attempting Hip Hop. In 'Psycho Killer' the needlepoint guitar is very Goth and the drums are brilliantly scrappy, only for the demented bass to make it seem like two bands are sharing the same studio. 'Blood On The Wall' is just an idea which didn't work, and the slow opening, then arty guitar grappling, of 'Tu N'Existes Pas' sounds disappointing, only for the closing remix to show what it has to offer, being seriously eerie. There's also a slinkier remix of 'Show Me', and I admit it, I'm impressed.

I haven't listened to music like this for quite a while, which really does stand to one side of current thinking, while having all the same empathy and desires. They have somehow stripped things down, having imaginations strong enough to create something insistent, out of almost nothing.

I would advocate serious research into them by you all.

SHOW ME
NOT VERY FUNNY
PSYCHO KILLER
BLOOD ON THE WALL
TU N'EXISTES PAS
SHOW ME (LOVE KILL MIX)
TU N'EXISTES PAS (NO HOP VERSION)

Official Site:
http://epk.chez.tiscali.fr/accueil.html

Elis
God's Silence, Devil's Temptation
~reviewed by Joel Steudler

It always surprises me when what seems to be an average gothmetal album turns out better than I expect. By all rights, Elis's God's Silence, Devil's Temptation shouldn't excite me at all. It's filled with mostly bog-standard examples of synth laden, atmospheric, theatrical gothmetal. On the surface it's a perfect fit for the kind of clonelike lineup Napalm has been pushing for years. It even uses the classic beauty & the beast format for vocals, with clean female crooning and low male grunts. What is it, then, that makes this a better than average entry into a crowded genre?

Easy answer. Sabine Duenser is what makes it better. She is a fantastic singer, with an airy mid-to-high pitched delivery that is smooth as silk. As capable a singer as she is, she may not have stood out much if not for the band making a few departures from the textbook gothmetal formula. 'Sie erfasst mein Herz' is a ballad (almost sounding like a lullabye) sung entirely in German. Now, prior to this I had not believed it possible to hear a female singer make the German language sound attractive and pretty. It's a very harsh sounding dialect, best spoken by bald musclebound thugs in darkened rooms. Sabine manages to make it palatable and even gentle sounding which is quite the accomplishment. The other ballady tracks on the album showcase both her range and the expressive qualities of her voice in a way the straight ahead rockers don't.

Elis's songwriting skills and instrumentation aren't exactly groundbreaking, but they get the job done. The ballads are the album's highlight. The more standard rock/metal based tracks are a bit too generic to excite me much, though they are professionally executed and full of the proper kinds of atmosphere and ambience. Elis seems to go into a sort of 'gothy-Nightwish' mode (sans Nightwish's powermetal trappings) on a frequent basis, but they execute the style well enough to get away with it. The album is quite listenable on the whole and never offends the ears, but if there was more originality in the songwriting or presentation, it would be a far better release.

There are probably those of you out there who can't get enough of this kind of music. Napalm Records banks on it, actually. So there is definitely a target audience that Elis's God's Silence, Devil's Temptation will reach and do quite well with. If they ditched the Gothmetal Handbook and all the requisite cliches and conventions of that genre to find their own unique voice, I would find the band more compelling. Ms. Duenser is clearly the star of the Elis show, and the tracks that showcase her performance make this a cut above the rest of the pack... but they are too few and far between to call the album a total success. That said, those who enjoy metal with a gothic tint will still get their money's worth out of God's Silence, Devil's Temptation.

Track List:
01.) Such a long time
02.) Where you belong
03.) Sie erfasst mein Herz
04.) Do you believe
05.) Engel der Nacht
06.) God's Silence
07.) Devil's Temptation
08.) Come to me
09.) My only love
10.) Child
11.) Abendlied

Elis is:
Sabine Duenser - vocals
Pete Streit- guitars
Jürgen (Big J) Broger - guitars
Tom Saxer - bass, additional vocals
Franco 'Franky' Koller - drums

Elis - official site:
http://www.elis.li/

Napalm Records:
http://www.napalmrecords.com/

Fiel Garvie
Leave Me Out of This (Foundling)
~reviewed by Mick Mercer

It's always good to find yourself presented with something unusual from the more thoughtful edges of the indie scene where it isn't tainted by 60's dross, and this is certainly an intriguing item, all done up in a beautiful gatefold digipack with matching slipcase.

And a shock style, of rare gentleness, which can't quite be called Ethereal because it's also very bold in its own spacious manner. True, it does open with seriously spooky ethereal vocals in 'b-rock' where the words are even pronounced in an interesting manner in an acoustic bowl inside which a guitar tinkles. A sense of rhythm grows out of the words and becomes diverting, almost hypnotic, but that's not all they do because a rich imagination makes 'i didn't say' bubblier, and their fumes become intoxicating. Let us go for a footballing analogy. Some teams rest easy defensively knowing they have a safe keeper behind them. The band know they have a commendably assured singer, providing the same effect. If they wilt, it isn't noticeable. And for a first comparison, which came to me several times throughout the album, think back to some of Daisy Chainsaw's slower material, without any vocal mania. (There is a hint of dementia, but it's just a quiver.)

'got a reason' is a bit flatulent, just mumbling along, although pleasantly vinegary guitar retained my interest, even though unctuous demons were whispering 'Shoegazing!' in my ears. There's a touch of truth in that, as they come from a pre lo-fi ethic, and it's dappled emotional indie, not rousing pop thrust. But you're still intrigued by the voice. You needn't expect any lyrical revelations from me, because I think they intentionally keep things fairly misty by the words used. Sure, they're mostly about relationship aspects, but you never know why or for what reason. What you do get, in 'doortime' is a voice like a sonic whisper and the tune is a saucy shroud.

Going sweetie-pop with 'Caught On' tested my patience a little for while not exactly vomit-inducing like St Etienne it does sail similar waters to the boasting lake horrors of many Sarah bands, and lacks the edge of other songs here. Perversely, I found their 'reeling as you come round again' equally sweet for all its puzzled vocal detachment and loping guitar, and then perked up still further through the undulating mischief of 'talking a hole in my head' which, with floppy non-drums and rawness, is almost dangerously frisky for them. Then the guitar mews like swifts as 'he goes, she goes' disintegrates into a becoming puddle.

Make way for a comparison! Coming through!!! 'there you go', has a pearly dewdrop drop to its rhythm. Then feel almost aghast at the way they piss over the end of 'old friend' in trying to enliven the faltering softness which borders on twee

They zither happily out on a lush peak with 'fake' and you can't help but he impressed by something which is, overall, seriously beautiful and unlike much of what you'll have heard recently. Quite what it would be like to then hear another album of roughly similar material, without specific variations in the music is something else, possibly rather dull, but that's for future, and the present is a highly desirable thing

B-ROCK
I DIDN'T SAY
GOT A REASON
DOORTIME
CAUGHT ON
REELING AS YOU COME AROUND AGAIN
TALKING A HOLE IN MY HEAD
HE GOES, SHE GOES
THERE YOU GO
OLD FRIEND
FLAKE

Official Site:
http://www.fielgarvie.co.uk

Flaming Fire
Grow Old and Die With Flaming Fire (Perhaps Transparent)
~reviewed by Mick Mercer

Hands up who remembers Suckdog? Okay, now let's try that without the St. Vitus Dance, shall we? If you're an astute visitor to my outpourings you'll remember that not so long ago I reviewed the demented 'Songs From The Shining Temple' album from these people and praised them their lurid dramas, and much the same is happening this time around. Think Suckdog, think wily peyote.

Of course, it's one thing to assemble jumbled slants on (un)popular brands of music, but to do it in a way which conveys charm is no easy struggle, and Flaming Fire snatch defeats from the paws of victory, then just throw it all away anyway. They're above such petty matters. To them they've had some aims, carried it through and we're left with an alien autopsy to conduct, with a full orchestra if so inspired.

It's pretty skewed construction usually, as in 'Rabbit', with spoken raconteur hindered as much as helped by yelping backing chants, while for music there is an adventure with teaspoons carried out by drunken sprites. It's nothing but space-age plumbing in 'Pedophiliac', but raw and raucous Talking Heads (big suit era) for 'Disco' so they know how to manhandle a tune. Badly. And still make it fizz.

Being more mature this time round they've got some covers, the most embarrassed being 'Word Up!' coming courtesy of a Ghostbusters convention, some folky spookiness called 'Whiskey River' where they're almost patient with the material and during 'Listen' you could swear that if the Baader Meinhoff had ever diversified into nursery rhymes this is how it would have been.

The most disappointing element has to be 'La La La' which just sounds like a cult trying to become a band, but they also have plainer fare, equally disruptive, which has American College Radio written all over it, with 'Why Do' not being a millions bad pairs of trousers away from They Might Be Giants, with Slitsish harmonies, and the primitive west coast psychedelia of 'In The Summer' (minus the West Coast affiliations, or any psychedelics, saved by cutely infuriating singing as though the original Velvet Underground were drowning in piss.

If that sounds like your cup of tea, go drink it.

RABBIT RUN TO THE RIVER
DISCO OF SOULS
PEDOPHILIAC
WHY DO BIRDS SOUND LIKE MOTORBIKES
LA LA LA
IN THE SUMMERTIME WHEN EVERYTHING IS HOLY
WORD UP!
WHISKEY RIVER
THE SUN IS A SNAKE
LISTEN TO FLUORESCENT LIGHTS

Official Site:
http://www.flamingfire.com

Perhaps Transparent:
http://perhapstransparent.com
 

Funker Vogt
Revivor
~reviewed by Dibrom

The problem with remix albums is that they lack coherency, and generally any sort of uniform quality. Revivor seems to be no real exception to this.  At a glance, Revivor appears to be a run of the mill remix album so common to this genre of music.  Upon a few thorough listenings, I can safely say that my assumption is not incorrect.

I believe the music here is generally likeable.  I mean, I *want* to like it anyway.  The problem is that it's just not particularly interesting.  We have the rather formulaic and predictable danceability present here and there, a few moments of inspirational and epic buildup, and some clever effects every other track or so but overall the approach throughout seems to be in playing it safe.  I suppose that I would have expected a little more differentiation in style from an album with tracks remixed by so many different groups, though overall things are rather monotonous in flavor.  This, monotony, moreso in a chromatic or logical sense than in that of animation or spirit, unfortunately does not translate to a coherence in theme or essence of the album.

This leads us to the next problem with the album: It becomes boring rather quickly.  On the first handful of listens it is driving and dynamic enough to hold your attention, but this effect drops off rather rapidly as time progresses.  I attribute a large part of this to a lack of vision across the whole of the album (by design or merit one could perhaps argue, given the case of a remix album) though a lack of depth even within each individual track probably plays a large role too.  With regular releases, Funker Vogt has been pretty good about telling a story or having some sort of message at the very least.  Here though the music is no longer more than the sum of its individual parts.  Instead it's more or less music for its own sake (maybe sound would be a better word there even), not really for a greater meaning.

Being a rather typical release of this kind once more in the area of technical proficiency, sound quality, and the nature of the music itself, I won't go into great depth on the matter.  If you've heard a Funker Vogt album before, especially a remix one, you'll know what to expect.

In fact, I think that about sums up the entirety of my view of the album:  It is not unexpected in any facet, and it is not groundbreaking in design or idea either.  It does not offer anything significant beyond a collection of tracks that might appeal to a Funker Vogt fan.  If this sounds appealing, it's probably worth checking out.  If you're looking for something special, look somewhere else.

Track List:
1)  Final Thrill (Remix by Christian Micheal of Flatline)
2)  History (Timeless Decay Mix by Icon of Coil)
3)  Lugner (Aghast View-Remix)
4)  Prisoners of War (Dance or Die-Remix)
5)  Faster Life (XPQ 21-Remix)
6)  Obscure Pictures (Welcome Acid Kids Mix by Noisex)
7)  Compulsions (re|worked)
8)  Stolen Thoughts (Given Memories Mix by Haujobb)
9)  This World (NVK-Remix by Vernon B.)
10) Red Queen (T.O.Y.-Remix)
11) Date of Expiration (Unit's Bad Eggs Mix by Unit 187)
12) Lugner (rearranged)
13) Lugner (Erzahl' mir doch mix)

Funker Vogt is:
Gerrit Thomas (composing, production, backing vocals)
Jens Kastel (vocals)

Funker Vogt - Official Site:
http://www.funker-vogt.com/

Metropolis Records:
http://www.metropolis-records.com/

The Gathering
Monsters
~reviewed by Joel Steudler

This EP, which highlights the song 'Monsters' off the superb album 'Souvenirs' by The Gathering, could have accurately been titled "How to ruin a perfectly good song by adding superfluous beats and repeating vocal phrases"... but that probably wouldn't have fit on the album jacket. I guess it wouldn't help sales any, either. My feelings are mixed about whether this is a good purchase for Gathering fans, though, since there's more to this book than its cover.

The meat of this meal is actually not the music, but rather the multimedia content on the CD. Contained therein are two lengthy videos. The first starts with a live performance of the title track and segues into a long but mostly dull interview of Anneke, conducted for a German TV station (but spoken in English) by an amiable goofball who is likely Europe's answer to Carson Daly. The second is a twenty-five minute long live concert video featuring 'Monsters' again, but also other material including 'Black Light District'. The sound quality is adequate but not particularly great, and the video is dark and no cinematographic masterpiece, but still it is engaging enough to hold the attention of the band's more ardent fans. 'Black Light District's ambient nature seems more suited to a studio release than a live setting, but at least provides an unusual curve in an otherwise straight road out of my computer's CD-ROM drive.

As for the remixes... well, if you have a high tolerance for electronica beats and don't mind a good song being turned into a repetitive and unengaging bore, you'll love them! I found little of merit in any of them except for the 'Promo Demo Mix', which breaks down the heavier side of the song and adds light melancholy piano and synths to a more propulsive percussion section. The vocal performance is left largely intact, which is better treatment than the other remixes offer. Artistically, none of the remixes can be called a horrible mistake, and all are executed professionally, I just don't care for the results of all the tweaking.

It seems, then, that the Monsters EP may be worthy of your $5.50 if you're a fan of the band, have a computer to watch the multimedia content on, and/or don't mind electronica-laced interpretations of the title track. Completists and anyone who stalks Anneke won't want to miss this, but the rest of us have a harder decision to make.

Track List:
01.) Monsters (Radio Mix)
02.) Monsters (Gallion Mix)
03.) Monsters (Gauzy Mix)
04.) Monsters Go Deep (Dance Mix)
05.) Monsters (Promo Demo Mix)

The Gathering is:
Frank Boeijen - keyboards & programming
Anneke van Giersbergen - vocals
Hugo Prinsen Geerligs - bass
Hans Rutten - drums & percussion
René Rutten - guitars

The Gathering - Official Site:
http://www.gathering.nl/

Psychonaut Records:
http://www.psychonautrecords.com/

The End Records (US):
http://www.theendrecords.com/

PETER H. GILMORE
Threnody for Humanity (Adversary Records)
~reviewed by Kevin Filan

You might expect Peter H. Gilmore, High Priest of theChurch of Satan, to grace the world with yet another
Death Metal CD.  But if you're cringing in anticipation of Boneheaded Blasphemy From The Depths of Mom's Basement, you're in for a pleasant surprise. Gilmore's Threnody for Humanity is utterly lacking in gravelly Cookie Monster vocals, strangled-cat guitar riffs, or all those other "Satanic" cliches you've come to know and laugh at. It's more Mahler than Manowar, more Stravinsky thanSlayer -- but it's also proof that "powerful" and "melodic" aren't mutually exclusive.

If Death Metal represents a Dionysian howl, Gilmore's vision is far more Appolonian.  His music appeals to intelligence as much as emotion, with numerous little "Black Easter eggs" left for those who have ears to hear.  The pipe-organ sounding bass line which works its way into a march in "Eternal War" evokes both J.S. Bach and John Phillip Sousa -- no mean feat.  "Requiem to Morrow" gives a nod to yet another work written for film,  Ralph Vaughan Williams' "Antarctica Symphony."  In "Let Us Prey" Gilmore even pays tribute to Schoenberg and the Serialists with permutations on an eerie 12-tone row.   With the final piece, "Rise," Gilmore reprises the moaning march of "Eternal War," resolving the tension with a sad minor chord that fades into silence.

Many of today's classical composers earn their crust by writing film scores.  The tunes on Threnody for Humanity were used as soundtrack music for the Nick Bougas documentaries "Death Scenes 2" and "Death Scenes 3."  Gilmore has taken that music and re-sequenced it, to create a piece which evokes "angry resistance to death, irony at some of the situations which bring it about, mourning for those departed, and finally, acceptance of the inevitable ways of Nature." This goal could easily send Gilmore sliding down the Slippery Slope of Pretension... but, thankfully, he's able to pull it off.  Perhaps more Goth/Industrial performers should study Elisabeth Kubler-Ross and her "stages of dying" -- it might make for more interesting listening.

If you're a fan of Dark Ambient, you'll definitely enjoy this work.  It's subtle enough to work as background music, yet complex enough to reward careful listening.  If you're interested in Classical Music, or if you feel guilty because you aren't interested, this might be a good starting point.  Gilmore's music is intelligent and classically influenced, yet accessible to someone who hasn't been exposed to the classics.

TRACK LISTING
1. Eternal War
2. Man's Destiny
3. That Which Is Falling
4. Requiem To Morrow
5. Conciousness Raising
6. Fate & Folly
7. Let Us Prey
8. Epiphany
9. Legend's End
10. Rise

Adversary Recordings
http://www.adversaryrecordings.com

Hammergun
Texas
~reviewed by Joel Steudler

Hammergun's Texas is a thundering slab of metal, oppressive and withering. It's like a slow-motion beating, cracking left hooks off your jaw and running you over with a sixteen-wheeler for good measure once you're down for the count. It could loosely be labelled 'stoner rock', but the ultra heavy low-riding grooves are more muscular than trippy. I don't know if these guys ever listened to Kyuss, but they are soul-brothers. Both bands deftly meld gruff vocals with ponderous subterranean riffs that will suck you into a hypno-trance and pulverize you with their crushing weight.

Adam Sherlock's gravelly shouted vocals are full of simmering rage that sometimes boils over into a raw throated howl. He ferociously belts out a steady stream of dour lyrics, sounding like that loner at the end of the bar who you really shouldn't pick a fight with. The guitars never compete with the vocals, since they're too busy digging a hole to China. The low, low fuzz washes everything in a gritty, dirty sandstorm of distortion and feedback. Topping off the mix is a crashy and clangy barrage of percussion that reinforces the truculent forward march of the music.

Unlike most metal acts, bands who fit into the stoner/desert scene have no obsession with speed. In fact they seem to actively disdain alacrity, preferring to lumber along at their own languid pace. Hammergun must be angrier than average since they break that mold ever so slightly and sometimes brutalize listeners at velocities approaching mid-tempo. It's odd, then, that time doesn't drag when listening to Texas. Sustaining a powerful mood with sloooooow riffs can hold a listener's interest as much as filling every second with as many frantic notes as humanly possible, I guess.

Hammergun's southwest style barrage of bass-frequency beatdowns is a real breath of dusty air... but then that's its appeal. Choking listeners with a stifling ocean of distorted fuzz is what they do best. If you're hyperactive, have attention defecit disorder, or are generally lacking in patience, this genre is not for you. If, however, you don't mind your metal coming at you in a slowly advancing wave of menace, you should consider taking a trip to Texas.

Track List:
01.) Intro
02.) Let 'er Ride
03.) Volumizer
04.) Haulin' Ass
05.) Sidewinder
06.) God's Country

Hammergun is:
Levi Lebo
Tyler Smith
Adam Sherlock
Sean McClaugherty
Damon Smith

Hammergun - official site:
http://www.hammergun.com

Stereo Recording Co.:
http://www.stereorecordingco.com

The End Records (US):
http://www.theendrecords.com/

History of Guns
The Mirror Pond EP (Liquid Len)
~reviewed by Mick Mercer

Apparently this would have been an album but the band downsized to EP status because they'd become 'consumed by business rhetoric', which is a pretty flimsy excuse if you ask me, albeit audacious.

The band whose reviews tag them with everything from psychotropic forms of Industrial to original Batcave deserve to dazzle, and to draw admirers to them, so you can forgive them many lapses. These are disturbed characters who spend time down the pub dreaming up caustic visions, but actually remember these plans when they hit the studio, and after the wonderful Disconnect CD here they are with more colourful abstract washes, and the heady stench of sewage.

'Moonburn' confirms all my worst fears. They can still create music which is a cross between film noir soundtracks and an ad man's cream, which traipses along in regal style, then for no apparent reason gets increasingly uglier, like an archbishop forgetting his vows of respectability and suddenly taking a shit on a zebra crossing in front of a crocodile of school children and teachers walking back from the local swimming pool.

'Compassion Fatigue' is a mockney mazurka where two songs seem overlapped, and it works well but I wonder why they do this, because there's a vital point to appreciate about these bastards. They have a stream, of ideas most bands would die for, but once they establish something beautiful they stamp it into the ground soon after. 'Mimozine' is a sensational accomplishment and manages to escape too much barbarism, and the wiggliest, 'Skin Can't Breathe' munches the air quizzically, but also stays fairly constant in its pustular approach.

The title track is a little too Joy Division at the beginning, with seismic bass added, but then the guitar pulls it away into lighter surrounds, and the singer seem to have a bad cold. I could have sworn he sang, "all we need is cabbage", only to discover the word is 'damage'. 'Psycho', which is the short extra track may be Bauhaus in a washing machine, approaching the spin cycle. The vocals bubble with a punky crudity, trapped in a whirlpool of sound

It's all here, from Tindersticks, to Inca Babies, Portishead and Suede, but more subtle and cheeky, equally individual but more up to date and ambitious. Add to that the unexpected moments of musical mangling and you really do have just about the most imaginative UK band attached to Goth - and they do actually label themselves as Post-Industrial Goth. None of this 'we're an alternative something or other, we don't like being put in a box' crap, when bands who say that deserve an air-tight box and nothing else.

In the old days this band would have been snapped up by 4AD or Beggars by now, but in the New Old Days labels can offer nothing because there's bugger all money left and they have no futures, so indie labels are THE future, on a small level. That means true fans will be that. True. They will follow up reviews, they will search for their new favourites, and they will make an effort as you won't find things in shops. This is a case in point, and as History Of Guns make records you'll never want to get rid of, they are worth your time and effort.

http://www.historyofguns.com for the link to order online at Darkcell Digital.

ISM
Mind Collapse
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

Sometimes a press sheet kind of kills the excitement of unwrapping a new promo. In the case of ISM, the press sheet, which is mailed to journalists and media, states that the CD is "actually being diffused to media (web-zines, fan-zines...)". No kiddin', eh? You'd think I got the version of the press sheet that goes out to consumers. Who don't get press sheets. Or maybe the one that's mailed to prospective labels, which the band didn't bother to change for me (and so I'll make fun of them for it). Ok, now that I got that out of my system, it's worth noting that the press sheet provided no insight into the actual music, so I was stuck inventing my own description. How's this: it's kind of like Marilyn Manson but not.

Mind Collapse is a 16-minute attempt at industrialized metal, and it basically represents the horribly mislabeled genre as well as Marilyn Manson ever did (also see The Kovenant or Gravity Kills). Shesa even employs a similar form of throaty vocals. That being said, it's hard to feel very strong about 16 minutes of music, and the first few times I listened to ISM it blew past me unnoticed. Before I remembered I was listening to something, the CD had quit spinning, my player emitting its usual grumpy groan. I give this information to you as a warning, so that you know my review may be unduly influenced by my disinterest in the music, and that you must always keep your fingers clear of my CD-player should you stop by for a visit.

The riffs are heavy as far as rock goes, likewise on the drums. The screamier vocals don't do quite enough damage to Shesa's esophagus to be considered 'extreme', but they're fairly angry (again, in a rock context). What I'm getting at is that ISM plays metal for the rock fan who doesn't care or know what real metal is. It's oh so loud and scary to the uninitiated, much in the same way Marilyn Manson once was, but those of us well versed in metal are apt to find it devoid of talent, artistry, and significance. I'll reserve my final judgment of the band for their next full-length work, but for now you can take my word for it: Mind Collapse is nothing to write home about. Making me wonder why I spent 10 minutes doing just that.

Track List:
1) Symbolic Androginy
2) Paranoid Dress
3) Zaichen
4) Presence

ISM is:
Shesa - vocals
Caos - synth & loops
Metustria - guitar
Syl - bass
Corax - drums

ISM - Official Site:
http://www.mindviolators.com/

In The Woods...
Live at the Caledonien Hall
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

If you've ever had the fine experience of hearing a song where everything felt "right", you'll understand how I feel about In The Woods... In addition to being an obsessive completist, I'm a rabid fan of ITW, and I'll buy anything they put out no questions asked. Yet these blind purchases consistently reward me with work of an otherworldly brilliance that is, simply put, unmatched. Live at the Caledonien Hall is a recording of the In The Woods... farewell performance (including much of their discography plus some new material), and it is every bit as necessary as all other ITW CDs.

ITW plays experimental metal that extends far beyond the usual confines of a "band" setting. Their songs effectively capture some emotion or idea or aspect of life and recreate it with ambient guitar, ebow, phenomenal riffing (both bass and guitar), and creative drumming. Perhaps even more impressive are the vocals (male and female solos plus duets). They are so painfully evocative that, in describing them, you'll be driven to use words like "magic" even at the risk of sounding corny. This set of live adaptations features everything I've described, but does lack many of the string instruments used on studio recordings.

Fortunately, ITW is comprised of musicians who are compelled to compose and play music for reasons that go beyond trying to fit a genre, or even trying to be seen as artistic or experimental. All of their classic material is here, and adapts remarkably well to a live setting. The tunes are at once immediately recognizable recreations of the studio pieces, but performed in ways that subtly favor concert performances. The riffs occasionally sound meatier, there no long stretches of quiet ambience, and in general the band emphasizes aspects of the music that can be recreated without hiring string quartets or anything else unfeasible.

I am unsure whether or not I would pick Live at the Caledonien Hall as the best starting point for ITW newcomers, though you can hardly go wrong with any of their material (excepting perhaps their raw demo performance, which is for the fans). Check out the free mp3 of "HEart of the Ages" on www.theendrecords.com and start hunting down ITW CDs HEart of the Ages, Omnio, and Strange in Stereo. In the meantime Live... is a superb collection of the band's work. The recording quality is equally magnificent, making this CD unquestionably mandatory to fans of the band. However, it should also appeal to those who enjoy the experimental side of metal (Arcturus, Ulver, Korova, etc.). Don't put it off! ITW is essential listening.

Track List:
Disc 1
1. Introducing...
2. Medley On Heartworks
3. HEart Of The Ages
4. Beer
5. White Rabbit
6. Mourning The Death Of Aase
7. 299.796 Km/s
8. I Am Your Flesh
9. Kairos
10. Weeping Willow
11. Omnio (pre)

Disc 2
12. Omnio (bardo+post)
13. Empty Room
14. Don't Care
15. Dead Man.s Creek
16. Karmakosmik
17. Path Of The Righteous
18. Titan Transcendence
19. Epitaph
20. Closing In
 

In The Woods... is:
X. Botteri
Jan Transit
Christer Cederberg
Oddvar A:M
C:M. Botteri
Anders Kobro
Synne Diana Soprana
Bjørn "Berserk" Hårstad

Karmakosmetix:
http://www.karmakosmetix.com/

The End Records (US distribution):
http://www.theendrecords.com/

The Kill
Extended Play
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

The Kill is a mildly heavy rock band with an angry vocalist that is entirely unconvincing. J. Knott is not bad at yelling, but he does so in such a boringly "rock" way that only fans of nu-metal or Dido will think he's really ticked off. Levi Lebo provides a series of generic guitar riffs, J. Depolite manages about as much with his bass, and Daniel Whitesides drums with the same fervor as the rest of the band.

If you read the last paragraph with a critical eye, you'll probably realize that I am a very biased listener when it comes to heavy and angry music. If I want heavy and angry, I go to Strapping Young Lad, or The Haunted, or even older Meshuggah. The Kill do not play metal or compete with those bands in terms of ferocity or energy, but the group is certainly competent enough to entertain listeners who don't like the more extreme music (which is fair... it's often seen as being over the top or lacking taste).

Extended Play is The Kill's first non-demo CD (logging in at only 20 minutes), and it does show some promise. The songs all contain a variety of riffs that are of varying quality (from the totally generic moshpit groove to the mildly exotic, as in "cigarette burns on the silver screen"), however, I admire the band for putting together songs with some measure of depth and diversity, even if the result is very hit or miss.

If you can't tell by my review, I'm not able to get excited about The Kill in any fashion. They're attempting to communicate anger on a level just below the extreme music I prefer. They do it reasonably well, but it comes across as slightly dull. If you're an experienced metal listener, pass this up and don't look back. But if you do enjoy the lighter side of heavy music and want to check out a promising new group, The Kill is worth your time.

Track List:
1) crashing a new sun
2) pale skin art
3) cigarette burns on the silver screen
4) manic
5) another kiss goodnight
6) 8mm black and white

The Kill is:
Levi Lebo - guitar
Daniel Whitesides - drums
J. Depolite - bass
J. Knott - vocals

Stereo Recording Co.:
http://www.stereorecordingco.com/

The End Records (US):
http://www.theendrecords.com/

Shawn Lane Classics Reviews
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

I once read that the best way to hook readers is to tell a sad story. Grab their attention with a real tragedy, get them emotionally involved, and once they're hooked - make your point. The story I'd like to share with you is about a little known musician from Memphis: Shawn Lane, a guitarist, pianist, composer extraordinaire. Although much of his music occupies that vague realm of genre crossovers known as fusion, Lane is at best a cult classic even within what is now a relatively small and oft-ignored style of music. His work is among the very best that fusion has to offer, and his abilities were unmatched (and likely will be for many years to come). Ever dedicated to honest music, his perseverance within a failing genre did not even allow him the money to buy health insurance. This fact hits much harder when you realize that he was suffering from psoriasis, severe psoriatic arthritis, and lung cancer. On September 26, 2003, he passed away.

Writing this piece is very difficult for me for two reasons. First of all, I feel as if it is useless trying to inspire interest in an artist that is no longer with us. If you buy his music now, is it simply too late? And secondly, although I never knew Shawn Lane, I am emotionally tied to his music (and perhaps indirectly, to him). Sharing his music with others feels like I'm sharing part of myself, so powerfully has his work affected me. Ultimately, I think it's "better late than never" when it comes to discovering great music, and I can put aside my own anxiousness for your sake.

There are a number of dimensions to Lane's music, and I couldn't possibly describe them all here. I think his greatest strength was in playing guitar leads with real substance. So much substance, in fact, that they appeared as tangible entities inhabiting a musical soundscape. They were never just a series of notes, but solid beings that moved, grew, and most of all, had feelings. They could be heart-wrenchingly depressing, excited and upbeat, compellingly exotic, or frighteningly otherworldly and beautiful. At times they even rushed into the recording as cascading sheets of sound.

Most of all, Lane's playing was fluid. Whether he was going faster than any other recorded guitarist or providing background harmony for another musician, his music was smooth and purposeful. This created a unique sound that was complete and never lacking direction, ever journeying to some end. Much of today's technical guitar music favors "technical guitar" over "music". The result is usually banal soloing for soloing's sake, and that's the most charitable way I can put it.

With Lane, you know you're getting the music above all else. This was best illustrated in his work with bassist Jonas Hellborg, another musician with astounding virtuosity and compositional skill. Together they crafted CDs that go far beyond "people playing notes and beats". Their music, particularly on Abstract Logic and Michael Shrieve's Two Doors, seamlessly melds unparalleled virtuosity with inventive melodies and powerfully communicative atmosphere. When you really break it down, these guys could sing with their instruments, and if you listen closely, you learn a little bit of who they are.

I could continue talking about Shawn Lane's legacy of literally unbelievable music, but for the sake of briefness I'll cut it short here. However, I'm including descriptions for some of Lane's CDs below. His work with Hellborg can be found on www.bardorecords.com, and you can also purchase his CDs at www.audiophileimports.com (best selection), or www.abstractlogix.com (who say "All profits from sales of any Shawn Lane /Jonas Hellborg records will be donated to his family"). It always feels a bit cheap to turn a piece such as this into an ad, but I have absolutely nothing to gain here. I honestly hope many of you will give Shawn Lane a chance, and there is not a single other artist or band that I could more fully recommend to music lovers.

Shawn Lane solo CDs:
Powers of Ten - now out of print (thanks a bunch, Warner Bros.), but easy to find on eBay. The instrumental music ranges from rock to pop to jazz, and also features a few oddball compositions (see "Paris").

The Tritone Fascination - this CD continued the direction of the first, and highlights Lane's diversity as a composer, keyboardist, and guitarist.

Powers of Ten Live - a more rockin' version of Powers of Ten that is, obviously, live, and thankfully much easier to find.

Lane and Hellborg CDs:
Michael Shrieve's Two Doors - jaw dropping guitar-centric compositions. Features some heavier rhythms, exotic melodies, and one of the best fusion/blues solos of all time (on "Juvalamu").

Abstract Logic - A must-have instrumental CD with Kofi Baker on drums. This CD has some of the most inventive melodies in the history of time, and each of the performers does one amazing solo track. Lane plays a solo piano piece, Pluie de Etincelles, and it is one of the most impressive pieces of music you'll ever hear.

Good People in Times of Evil - Lane takes a backseat on this one, providing lots of reverbed melodies that float over Hellborg's Indian influenced rhythmic assault. Accompanied by V. Selvaganesh, an Indian percussionist whose ability both frightens and excites me.

Personae - This is the CD technical guitar fans will most want to buy, as the performances are unusually manic and crazed. This is likely the fastest guitar playing out there.

*Time is the Enemy - Another ultra-high-energy release with stunning performances and one of the most mind-blowing guitar solos in the history of the instrument (on the title track, a retitled, live version of a track appearing on Shrieve's "Two Doors").

* Description by Rog the Frog Billerey-Mosier of www.ssmt-reviews.com

Relevant Links:
Places to buy the music -
www.abstractlogix.com
www.audiophileimports.com
www.bardorecords.com (label webpage for Hellborg/Lane CDs)

Information on Shawn Lane -
www.noproblemhere.com
www.angelfire.com/tn2/shawnlane/enter.html (official site)
www.tarsun.net (features an extensive discography)

Little Match Girl
Little Match Girl (Planet Ghost)
~reviewed by Mick Mercer

This is peculiar in many ways, being bewitchingly modern yet wracked by old fashioned guitar antics, with the overriding sensation remains one of excitement.

They have a reputation, a slightly perverse aura about them, and they're not big on self-promotion, yet there is a vast array of ingredients angrily ripping at the seams of an album they should feel proud to cast light upon, because they're up there with the best, and the heaviest.

It starts off all twinkly and modest , introducing typically arch female assassin vocals being spoken and the electro pulse pecking at your ankles, then opening out into a gaseous field with disparate, dislocated sections and layer upon later of light Industrial mush and you could be excused for thinking this was an ambient experiment. Then 'Victim' poleaxes you with very cool and clever riffing, in a wheezing, curdled tune, and while you can see the joins in their timing, which slightly interrupts the flow, the thing really grabs you.

Then it just coasts, full of noise, bravado and enticing moments. There are very few lows, and when the highs are hit they sustain them. The sense of human character doesn't come through a great deal, just skittish in occasional bursts. It has a stern, disciplined feel to it, as well as some ferocity.

'A&R' is funny, and bleepy ('Clangers: The Early Years'), but for the majority of this record you are in the company of riff addicts who trim everything down so that frenzy can breathe, with brief gulping pit stops of serenity, or trickery, before plunging back into the mania and rock meltdown.

I presume 'White Queen' is something dull about drugs because it gets all choking and moody, bloated and a bit boring, but the techno remnants of 'Space Witch' with the twisted punky vocal energy and pop chorus is one of two songs here (along with 'Black Days') which could have been massive if properly produced and encouraged. Both are fairly magnificent, but could have been epic if streamlined. They're stressed, they're agile, they're off on some suicidal mission.

'On The Road' goes down a cul-de-sac, being old fashioned thrash and a mere pace race, but the final few tracks bring the music through more. Things become jumpier, more atmospheric and bloodshot, rarely static, always pulsing, and constantly inventive; attacked by those coppery riffs, spiralling downwards into heat and mystery

They're weird, basically, and they'll make you love them given half the chance. Great as this is, I don't think it's even half the record it might have been, and that certainly makes what is to come very interesting

1. THE NORTH/CRASH INTRO
2. VICTIM
3. A&R
4. BULLET
5. MY QUEEN
6. SPACE WITCH
7. SATISFACTION
8. BLACK DAYS
9. BURN ME UP
10. ON THAT ROAD/SOME NOISE
11. VERSION X
12. GALAXY NATION
13. ENDLESS MADNESS
14. DCO

Official Site:
http://www.littlematchgirl.co.uk

Planet Ghost:
http://www.planetghost.co.uk

Site for the artist whose work adorns the CD cover, well worth a visit!
http://www.mickusher.com

Order it!
http://www.darkcelldigitalmusic.net/artist_music.cfm?a=115

Loren Nerell
Taksu
~reviewed by Goat

I had this CD in the stereo when one of my friends came to visit, and her comment was, "Is this supposed to be relaxing?  It sounds like someone died!"  Well, I'm not sure really if the intention of this ambient music in particular or any ambient music in general is to be relaxing, but I found her analysis of "Taksu" to be interesting. Loren Nerell's musical influences range from Tangerine Dream to Balinese ritual gamelan music, so, the seriousness of the music to its maker could definitely be construed as having the gravity of acknowledging death.  Loren has made a long career of studying electronic music and melding his knowledge of it with a profound curiosity and fascination with Balinese and Javan ritual and culture via sound. The results of his journeys through musical technique and cultural ritual are well- represented with the presentation of Taksu.

Taksu is a meandering piece, full of organic sounds and low moans; a hint of crickets, people talking far away, the insinuation of moisture.  The album is one continuous track, lasting an hour, 9 minutes, and 17 seconds.  So, this is definitely a good CD to put on and lose yourself in whatever you're doing, be it focusing on the music itself, focusing on what's inside your head when you close your eyes, painting that painting you've been putting off, or whatever it is that suits you. Because of the mixture of organic and grounded sounds, Taksu is a good album to listen to on a day when the earth is starting to feel too heavy, too industrial, too abstract and too inhuman.  Taksu places one gently in the cool waters of human perception, and lets the brighter, clearer, cleaner aspects of biology and the natural environment take over.  I would say the overall effect of the piece is one of cleansing.  In spite of my friend's allegation that "it sounds like some- one died, " I confess I do find Taksu relaxing; invigorating, inspirational.
It's a nice piece for clearing out my head, focusing on my heart, and letting the world go by.

Distributed in the US by:
www.soleilmoon.com

Loren Nerell's home site:
http://home.earthlink.net/~lnerell/

About gamelan music:
http://www.ancient-future.com/bali.html

GLENN LOVE
cruel utopia  (Toronto)
~review by Kevin Filan

For several years now, we've been listening to Goth bands producing reformulated (some would say
regurgitated) 80s music.  Glenn Love is part of the Next Wave.  His synthesizer stylings are firmly grounded in the late 90s/early Aughties; instead of hearkening back to Depeche Mode, his "cruel utopia" evokes a darker Astral Projection, an Infected and Poisonous Mushroom.  It's Thoroughly Modern Music,
which shows all the strengths and weaknesses of Trance/Ambient dance music.

In the best trance tradition, he finds a Really Cool Sound and repeats it until he comes up with another Really Cool Sound.  This is not really very interesting, unless you're chemically enhanced.  Arnold Schoenberg, Robert Fripp and Brian Eno, among others, broke the rules AFTER they learned them.  At its worst, this is lazy, not challenging, composition.

"cipher" is tuneful, and has a danceable beat, but Love doesn't really go anywhere with it.  At 7:25, it's a good two minutes too long.  The drum machine sounds, well, like a drum machine.  While "photo" and "mind" have a bit more of an edge, Love doesn't really develop on his themes.  It's unfortunate; he has a good ear, and a feel for music which gets under your skin.  He could benefit from some composition classes, or from a study of Serialism or other alternative ways of developing tension within a tune.

Of course, it could just be that I'm a boring old fart who doesn't understand post-postmodern music.  "cruel utopia" begins with a slightly faster beat, and a pulsating bass line that put my JBL subwoofer through its paces.  I've gathered that in Cali many once-industrial DJs have repackaged themselves as "Psytrance."  They should include this track in their mixes, then segue into "kool utopia."  The jaunty circuslike opening, reiterated throughout various permutations, captures joy and dread in one fell swoop that you can dance to... dark ambient trance at its best.

"in exile" and "sea of forgotten dreams..." may be the strongest tracks on the CD.  Both build up an atmosphere of dread, playing samples and dissonance against a pulsing beat.  It's music that makes you
nervous even as you shake your booty.  If Love continues in this direction, his next CD will definitely be worth listening for.  His recent tours of Germany should expose him to a new audience... and should also be a great educational experience.  The country which gave the world Kraftwerk and which discovered Giorgio Moroder certainly has a few things to offer a talented young synth artist like Love.

1) cipher
2) cruel utopia
3) photo
4) mind
5) in exile
6) sea of forgotten dreams...
7) kool utopia

Glenn Love website
http://www.glennlove.com

Love Life
Here Is Night, Brothers, Here The Birds Burn
~reviewed by Matthew Heilman

I am about a year late with this review, but here we go nonetheless: Love Life is one of a handful of newer dark bands that have been brought to my attention as of late that give me hope for the future.   I absolutely love this CD and I am so excited that this kind of music is being released today. I very well might get to see this band live, I will see them evolve, and listening to their music (and bands like Swann Danger, Turn Pale, The Prids, etc) make me feel as though I am the midst of dark music history.  It is about goddamn time dark bands that don’t rely on the same worn out electronics or the same safe and basic formulas are beginning to surface.  And while Love Life is, purely by the dictionary and literary definition of the term, a band with an unmistakably dense atmosphere of Gothicism, they are more or less stationed in the Indie scene.  As a few people that are much smarter than I am have forewarned me, the future of Goth is not going to be found in the places we usually haunt, or from the labels we depend upon. Sure Metropolis, Middle Pillar, and Projekt will release some cool stuff, the truly mind blowing bands are either unsigned or outside the immediate club scene, and most of these bands are boiling over in the Indie scene.  So we must seek them out and bring them to your attention. So without further adieu or preaching, I give you Love Life.

It’s not often that I get to use such a masculine adjective as ‘bellowing’ to describe a female vocalist.  But that is exactly what Katrina Ford, Love Life’s ruthless front woman, does throughout most of the pummeling compositions that make up this release (which is the band’s second full-length album).   Her deep voice writhes and twists in agony and whispers in lulling manic desperation; she beckons beneath disguised threats and teases with an unbridled (if not crazed) sensuality.  What’s perplexing is that she appears to possess a relatively tiny frame, and I can’t help but wonder where the hell that voice is coming from!  The remaining three core musicians of the band provide the platform upon which her confrontational vocal style is executed. Additionally, the band has enlisted the talents of a live string quartet and various brass musicians.   So there is a lot going on and a great deal of noise being made.

There very well might not be a single moment on the entire disc where a traditional rhythm structure is followed.  Katrina’s violent vocal performances are supported by equally violent and raucous musicianship.  The sound of Love Life is one of manipulated chaos and frantic disjointed aural delights.  Your prickling ears will be saturated in sharp frenzied guitar work, while anxious notes are wrung from the bass with impressive dexterity and loose cascades of percussion sneakily roll from beneath the surface or
bash and crash with a punishing force.   Slithering violins and cello add a dash of surreal class, and rusty saxophone or trombone echoes with jarring discord.  Ominous cathedral organ adds an even greater apocalyptic tone to it all, and I couldn’t help but think of the old black and white horror film “Carnival Of Souls” every time the organ sounds on this disc.  It has the same chilling eeriness and timbre.

When at their most dissonant, as on tracks like “Montag” and “Good For Nothing,” Love Life is a claustrophobic mess of sound, yet an aural cyclone which fans of ultra dark and provocative music will embrace with feverish enthusiasm.  There are several melodic treasures to be unearthed, best sought for in the ‘ballad’ “Sweet Nocturne” and “Joy.”  There are even some crafty lyrical puzzles in “V,” where Katrina rattles off as many verbs as she can muster that begin with the letter V.  The end result is kooky, absurd and totally surreal.

The use of vintage organ sounds and a good number of the guitar riffs invoke a pinch of psychedelia, while there is a subdued dose of deconstructed rockabilly and blues, a la The Birthday Party.   But the intensity is always bubbling over past its volcanic peak, as Katrina wails and grunts with deranged fury and agitated grace.   I have seen some relatively lukewarm reviews of this disc in various Indie zines, but Love Life might just be too bizarre and too dark for most Indie kids.  Love Life is probably too dark and too bizarre for most Goth kids too.  But I personally enjoyed the mental thrashing and understated, unpredictable aural assaults that this band had to offer, and for those of you looking for something dark and challenging, sinister yet somewhat playful, and all together strange, Love Life is an absolute must.   Post Punk enthusiasts and angsty old school curmudgeons – pay heed and as the opening track suggests, listen loudly!

Track List:
1.) Listen Loudly
2.) Montag
3.) Joy
4.) Be Kind To Me
5.) Sweet Nocturne
6.) Good For Nothing
7.) V
8.) *

Love Life is:
Katrina Ford: vocals
Sean Antaneitis: guitar, organ
Anthony S. Malet: bass, guitar, piano
David Bergender: drums, percussion

With:
Jennifer Hutt: violin
Burleigh Seaver: violin
Meredith Yayanos: violin
Amy Domingues: cello
Tim Hoenig: tenor sax
Tim Doschner: trombone, trumpet
F. Vattel Cherry: double-bass

Love Life – Official Site:
http://www.templeoflovelife.com

Jagjaguwar Records:
http://www.jagjaguwar.com
 
 

Mara's Torment
Body Music
Secret Music
Chill
~reviewed by UncleNemesis

Welcome to the world of DIY electronica. Mara's Torment is the one-man project of Rik Maclean, a Toronto-based electronics-mangler who devotes his time to the construction of oozing, shuddering, skittish, langourous, liquid, slab-like oceans of ambient sound. Now, if you think all that is contradictory to the point of foolishness, well, yes, it is. But you can hear all of that and more in the music of Mara's Torment. Or, at least, I can. I'm perfectly willing to concede that it just might be me, mind.

I suspect Rik himself would crack a wry smile at my descriptions. His own website is full of self-deprecating humour, and he's quite ready to take an ironic poke at the absurd hoops of hype through which the music business routinely expects artists to jump. Here's an extract from his own bio:

Mara's Torment studies the darker side of the human psyche, creating a tapestry of feeling using the threads of emotions we all share but rarely discuss.

(Please don't laugh at me. This is a press release and people that read press releases like that sort of stuff... they like phrases like "a tapestry of feeling" and stuff like that. Trust me, they don't wanna hear "Rik is a guy that makes music alone in the dark in his bedroom".)

Elsewhere on the site, Rik provides brief descriptive notes on some of his releases, but I've deliberately avoided these, because...well, I want to see what sort of pictures are conjured up in *my* head. Body Music is a compendium of diversity (there's another one for the press release, Rik). Here there are easy, snake-like movements; over there some weirdly bubbling fluids. Loping beats, faux-jazz melodies, busy rhythms, sudden bursts of bustle. It's as if we're wandering around a city, glancing into doorways, peering round corners, braving the darkest alleys, and everywhere we look, there are different things going on. Countless vignettes of activity; all human life is soundtracked. Individual lives, individual activities, all knitted together, connected and combined, by the one common factor of The City.

Secret Music unwinds slowly. It's after dark; the city sleeps. Or does it? We glimpse occasional evidence of night-time action, but it's all ill-defined. Lights, sound, leaking out through closed doors. Things are going on, but we're on the outside, looking in, walking the stubbornly quiet streets with nothing but the atmospheres swirling about us. Sometimes, we catch the odd, half-heard rhythmic sound of the great machine of the city ticking over, ready to crank up to the max again in a few short hours...

The theme of Chill, on the face of it, should be obvious. This is Mara's Torment going for the post-club come-down thing, right? Relaxed, enveloping, Sunday-morning music, to ease you gently back into real life after a night of partying? Well, actually, no. Quite the opposite, in fact. In this case, Chill has a rather more uncomfortable meaning. It's Chill as in cold, harsh, uncompromising; the cold shoulder, the cold stare. The music here is all angles and hard surfaces, screeches and clangs, rhythms which seem to march straight at you with a not altogether friendly glint in their eyes. Sometimes, the music drops back, creating space, creating...loneliness. Other times, it's right up front, assertive, challenging. This is the soundtrack to facing up to problems, facing down demons. It gets pretty stark at times, but a spark of optimism glows into life at the end. We end on a warm note.

Of course, all the foregoing probably amounts to a complete re-weaving of Rik Maclean's patent 'tapestry of feeling'. I've purposely avoided any hints or guidelines to the music and just dug a few images out of *my* consciousness. In this I've been assisted by the fact that the Body Music and Secret Music CDs don't appear to have any individual track titles. Chill *does* have titles, but it's a rule of this game that you should never look at the titles until after you've interpreted the music for yourself. You can read the titles below - judge for yourself whether I've captured the flavour.

So, that's Mara's Torment. Soundtracks for the movies inside your head - where, of course, the pictures are so much better....

The tunestacks:
'Body Music'
(No individual titles)

'Secret Music'
(No individual titles)

'Chill'
Remembering Something New
Vacuum
Your Pieces Of Me
The Hierarchy Of Emotions
Forgotten
A New Language
That Time Has Passed
This Is Goodbye

The Mara's Torment website: http://www.corpusnet.com/torment

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis:  http://www.nemesis.to
 

Murder At The Registry
Filed: '83 - '03 (Strobelight)
~reviewed by Uncle Nemesis

Murder At The Registry, it seems, have been around for ten years. This, their first 'real' album, if you discount early self-released cassettes, brings together an assortment of tracks from a decade's worth of singles and EPs, plus some 2003 material. It's an ideal introduction to a band which has plenty of history behind it, if a rather sparse discography. Murder At The Registry have notched up a certain amount of recognition in their home territory of Germany - but they've never made that elusive big breakthrough. Maybe this compilation will change all that, because this is a band which deserves to be better known.

So, this is what you get. Sixteen tracks, three different line-ups, and an entertaining variety of hairstyles in the through-the-ages promo pix. The tracks are not presented in chronological order: for example, 'Addicted', the oldest song here, an out-take from an early cassette release, comes up as track 6. Therefore it's not easy to get an impression of the band's development over the years - older songs, recorded on 8-track and displaying endearingly vintage production values, actually crop up in the middle of the album, bookended by material from 1999 and 2003. Maybe that was intentional, because although the line-ups have changed and the production has improved over the years, the essential ingredients of the Murder At The Registry sound have remained consistent.

This is a band rooted in the post-punk styles of the early 1980s - that heady period when punk had brought the barriers tumbling down, and all manner of weird and creative stuff grabbed its chance to push through. The band themselves mention The Chameleons, Comsat Angels, And Also The Trees and Christian Death as their influences, and indeed if you're looking for reference points those fit the bill very well (although Bunny Peculiar has just suggested Play Dead as another possible name to drop in this context - and yep, they fit, too!)

But don't run away with the idea that Murder At The Registry are some sort of retro outfit, trying to drag the past into the present. They are most definitely not slaves to their influences: the over-riding impression I get from this compilation is that here is a band which, at the heart of everything, has always done its own thing.

In no sort of order, some highlights. 'The Creatures Are Having Fun With The Hollywood Dreamblaster' is one of the new tracks, and it's immediately obvious that the production is much more upfront and assertive than the older stuff. It's a gung-ho romp, somewhat akin to the Cure at their most playful. The guitars go dang-a-dang-a-dang, the beat goes stomp-THWACK, and the vocals are declaimed with gleeful dramatics. 'Pump' might be familiar as Murder At The Registry's contribution to the first Hex Files compilation album: it's a burst of manic energy, the vocals yelped out as if Thomas, the singer, has just stepped on a tin tack. As it happens, it's probably the most 'Batcave' track Murder At The Registry have ever recorded, and, while it's fun, it's not particularly typical of the band's overall style. 'Addicted', the aforementioned early track, is a mid-tempo ballad, quite a bleak little thing in its way. 'Das Lied der Schwermuth' dates from 1999, and features lyrics lifted from Neietzsche - it's a rollicking old art-rock extravaganza, like Rozz-period Christian Death, high drama all the way. 'Death Passion' is an end-of-the-century angst-rant, an angular, awkward, post-punk rocker, the bass and drums working away like vintage Gang Of Four. Curiously, the vocals seem almost Welsh on this one. With this in mind, I'm struck by how much 'Mein Wirres Kind' has a bizarre John Cale feel to it - this song would drop right into one of Cale's solo albums and fit in very neatly.

A few songs don't quite hit the mark - 'Freight Train', for example, is a frankly rather forgettable tune with low-key vocals at the start which give way to a lengthy, mellow, almost jazz-rock number, like a late night Steely Dan mood-track. It trundles along in an oddly polite fashion - I was expecting a thundering, clanging, monster, but this is one freight train that never quite gets a green light. In the interests of providing a comprehensive overview, I suppose it's appropriate to include this song, and the one or two others which have my finger twitching in the direction of the 'skip' button, but for me Murder At The Registry are at their best when they've got a bit more passion in the fuel tank. Fortunately, there's plenty of passion here. Here's hoping that it doesn't take another ten years for the band to release their next album.

The tunestack:
Cupido
Reconsider?
Blessed Curse
Das Leid Der Schwermuth
Mein Wirres Kind
Addicted
Brainsong
Always On The Brink
Death Passion
Freight Train
Wo Bin Ich?
Pump
Epiwaltz
The Stolen Photograph
The Creatures Are Having Fun Wioth The Hollywood Dreamblaster
Frozen In Hesitation

The amalgamated ten-year line-up:
Thomas - Bass, vocals
Martin - Guitar, backing vocals
Holger - Guitar
Melanie - Synths
Andrea - Synths
Stefan - Drums
Carsten - Drums

The website: http://www.murderattheregistry.com

Strobelight: http://www.strobelight-records.com

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis: http://www.nemesis.to

Mörk Gryning (Sweden)
Pieces of Primal Expressionism
~reviewed by Joel Steudler

Mörk Gryning's Pieces of Primal Expressionism is -hands down- the best black metal album I have listened to in ages. It embodies all that I value in this kind of music. It is artistically challenging and full of interesting musical ideas that venture off in unexpected directions. Top notch performances are turned in on guitar, bass, drums, vocals, and all the assorted extras that wind through the album's eight songs. The production is clear and distinct, allowing all the various layers of sound to occupy their own sonic space without coagulating into a buzzy mess. Intense aggression, hypnotic rhythms, calm but dark interludes, catchy hook laden riffs and dense ambiences fill the album from start to finish. In short, it has it all.

The quality of the production cannot be overstated and should not be lightly regarded. Too often modern black metal acts assault the ears with painful rawness or the 'wall of sound' approach (prime culprit: Dimmu Borgir). Such techniques render the music impotent by destroying the listener's ability to appreciate and comprehend the performance. Some bands have figured this out, much to their own betterment (like Immortal and Grimfist, for example) while others soldier on in their war to rupture their listeners' eardrums. Mörk Gryning made the right call when they entrusted their sound to Daniel Bergstrand (owner of the studio where In Flames, Meshuggah, and Soilwork record... say what you want about the decline in each band's artistic merit, they still sound fantastic) and not to a broken tape recorder and an amp turned up to 11.

'Progressive' and 'experimental' are terms one could use to describe the titular pieces of primal expressionism. Each song is a journey filled with twists and turns, thrills and spills, ham and eggs, a cheese omelette... sorry, got off track there. An 'aggression omelette', perhaps, made of delicious riffs and seasoned with tasteful solo leads. Don't think it's all pretty melodies and bubblegum though - far from it. The vocals are driving, visceral rumbles from an angered beast and the percussion often strays into the traditional furious blackmetal beatdown mode. All of the more traditional metal elements are punctuated with off kilter violin or keyboard interludes that add to the disquieting atmosphere which pervades the album.

Adding together all the positive virtues of Mörk Gryning's latest burnt offering makes it impossible to not recommend it to the enlightened and open minded. Fans of symphonic black metal and related genres will definitely find much to enjoy here. Unless your idea of the ultimate black metal album is Ildjarn doing covers of Ulver's Nattens Madrigal, you should definitely pick up Pieces of Primal Expressionism.

Track List:
01.) The sleeping star
02.) The cradle of civilization
03.) Perpetual dissolution
04.) Our urn
05.) An old man´s lament
06.) The worm
07.) Fragments and pieces
08.) On the verge of prime divinity

Mörk Gryning is:
GOTH - Bass, Guitar, Vocals
KIMERA - Drums, Guitar, Vocals
AEON - Synthesizers, Mellotron, Backing vocals

Guest appearances:
Avatar: First solo in Our urn, and solo in Perpetual dissolution.
Nick Eastop: Trombone on The sleeping star, and An old man’s lament
Ulrika Eastop: Violin on The cradle of civilization
Örjan Örnkloo: Additional synthezisers and samples

Mörk Gryning - official site:
http://www.mork-gryning.com/

No Fashion Records:
http://www.nofashionrecords.com

The End Records (US):
http://www.theendrecords.com/

Nevermore
Enemies of Reality
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

Nevermore is an excellent metal band both on and off-stage. Warrel Dane's approach to 'singing over modern heavy thrashy metal' is both melodic, engaging, and highly unusual, but always remarkable. Jeff Loomis writes metal riffs and solos of the highest caliber (most easily compared to Testament), and Van Williams beefs the music up with his dynamic drum deluge. Jim Sheppard... er... plays the bass. I think. It's a bit hard to hear, really. And now that I've goofily segued into the subject of production, the key focus of this review, let's discuss why Enemies of Reality is Nevermore's worst CD to date.

Their songwriting and playing is still good, and roughly in the same vein as their last CD, Dead Heartin a Dead World, but heavier and more brutal. Unfortunately, the production on Enemies of Reality is so blatantly terrible that I can scarcely stand to listen to it. If not for my sacred duty as Metal Reviewing Guy #374,268, I'm quite certain I would never listen to Enemies of Reality again. Thing is - I'm not some haughty pusher of slick progressive production. I think that the production should closely match artists' musical intent (wherever that takes them), and I don't mind when bands can't afford their dream recording quality.

Nevermore has released several CDs with good production, and they're clearly quite capable of renting nice studios and hiring talented producers. This time around, they switched producers and found some guy to make their CD intolerable. Essentially, I think it went something like this: Nevermore - "We want a really brutal heavy CD, but without having to do the work of changing our style. Is there any way we can simply repeat our old music, but record it so that it's all heavy and neat-like?" Their Last Producer - "Fools! You know not what evil forces you tamper with! Go this route and you shall produce the most awful sounding recording in metal history! I use lots of exclamations! Evil! EVIL!"

Unfortunately, Nevermore went down the dark path, sold their souls or something, and ended up with their usual quality sound marred and beaten and battered by over-compression and nasty clipping. By all means, listen to the free mp3 on www.centurymedia.com. If the sound does not immediately turn you off, this is a fine metal CD to purchase. But I can't openly recommend a work that is so grossly mutated by the forces of over-compression. The guitars cut out of the mix periodically, the drumming is indistinct, the vocals buried underneath so much muck. I'm still not convinced that there is a bassist in the band. Unless you're looking for throbbing head-banging music with a faint Nevermore tinge, avoid Enemies of Reality.

Track List:
1) Enemies of Reality
2) Ambivalent
3) Never Purify
4) Tomorrow Turned into Yesterday
5) I, Voyager
6) Create the Infinite
7) Who Decides
8) Noumenon
9) Seed Awakening
 
Nevermore is:
Warrel Dane - vocals
Van Williams - drums
Jim Sheppard - bass
Jeff Loomis - guitars

Nevermore - Official Site:
http://www.nevermore.tv/

Century Media Records:
http://www.centurymedia.com/

Pissing Razors
Evolution
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

Pissing Razors is a sort of guilty pleasure for the serious metal fan. Their music is largely palatable, although they can successfully batter their listeners with angry-as-all-hell metal when they want to - just try last year's Live in the Devil's Triangle. Their newest effort walks the fat line between radio rock and contemporary, non-mainstream metal. Unfortunately, this makes their work redundant for fans who enjoy both popular rock and metal.

I, for instance, am apt to partake in Publick Listening Sessions of Radiohead, A Perfect Circle, Tool, or not-on-the-radio radio rock such as Jeff Buckley. These artists call upon vast emotional storehouses of depth, vitality, and feeling. Even if they don't have metal rhythms, heavy guitars, or brutal drumming, their music still affects me profoundly. Pissing Razors is slowly entering the realm of rock, but with enough metal fervor to appeal to heavy music fans who just can't make the leap to popular works. The band is a compromise - they'll meet you half way. Similarly, rock fans who want to branch into metal without jumping into, say, Zyklon (who I also like) can easily start here.

Pissing Razors' sound is actually kind of Pantera-ish and a bit Machine Head-ed, in that heavy grooves (coming soon to a mosh pit near you!) and nifty stylish drums are mixed with some angry vocals. The rock element is introduced by the vocalist, who sometimes does clean, relatively non-melodic and fairly laid back vocal lines to sound 'cool'. There aren't any engaging melodies and hooks (within the rock moments) nor technical and challenging heaviness (within the metal moments). And therein lies Pissing Razors' flaw: they just don't stack up to the bands they're competing against because they dilute the two styles they draw on.

The chorus on "two face devil" sounds like Nirvana gone hardcore, but it's not quite hardcore, and it's not quite Nirvana. Much of the CD plays out in this way, falling just in between capturing punishing metal severity (their previous live CD) and catchy grunge/alternative/nu-metal (what may well be their next CD). Pissing Razors does kind of stick to one sound across Evolution, perhaps excluding "evolucion", which is mysteriously sung in Spanish. But it's a good sound, and they pull it off well. If you like creative popular rock or extreme metal, you'll find neither here, but you will get a decent hybrid of the two. All in all, an excellent starter CD for fans of either side of the spectrum looking branch out.

Track List:
1) no way out
2) fall away
3) hanging on the cross
4) evolution
5) perseverance
6) the threshold
7) takedown
8) two face devil
9) replace the day
10) evolucion'

Pissing Razors is:
Eddy Garcia - drums
Andre Acosta - vocals
Rick Valles - bass
Matt Diablo - guitar, b-vocals

Pissing Razors - Official Website:
http://www.pissingrazors.com/

Spitfire Records:
http://www.spitfirerecords.com/
 

Rapoon
I Am A Foreigner
~reviewed by Goat

Imagine yourself in say, wing-tipped shoes, freshly shined. Imagine now a nice wool tweed suit. Perhaps a briefcase and a pair of wire-rimmed glasses. Now open your eyes. Sand swirls around you, seeps into your shoes. The heat is becoming unbearable; a suit is all wrong for this. Take a deep breath. You are a foreigner.

The wonderfulness of these recordings has to do with the layering of conception, perception, and reality that is probably best expressed through travel. The uncomfortable feeling of never quite knowing if you're handing the street vendor the right amount of money. The knowing eyes, who view your clothes and know that you are "Other." The uncertainty, the excitement, the longing for home. All of this is here in these recordings.

Robin Storey has an amazing, truly breathtaking body of work, not one piece of which is a toss-off. Add I Am A Foreigner to the stack. There is an aliveness that crackles through the room when this CD is on. The emotions and sensations that come with it are delightful. I know I may seem like I wear a certain cheesy and toothful grin whenever I'm reviewing a Robin Storey album, but I cannot help it. I am completely enthralled by the work of this man; his paintings and his music are things I continue to treasure.

Rapoon website:
http://www.pretentious.net/Rapoon/

Distributed through:
http://www.soleilmoon.com

THE SAND
The Memory of Dead Romances
~reviewed by Kevin Filan

Italian musician Umberto Marconi (working as The Sand) sent a very pleasant note along with his very pleasant demo disc, The Memory of Dead Romances.  Very few musicians specifically request criticism, and even fewer recognize that a bland and noncommittal review suggests that your music didn't effect the listener at all.  That kind of honesty and perception deserves an honest and perceptive review... and I hope I can live up to the task.

Marconi's music is generally "Gothic" ... but in a way that shows just how much "Gothic" has changed since its beginnings.  Some of his influences are drawn from Goth's dark and early beginnings.  "Prayers" and "Krime 3" hearken back to vintage Joy Division and Sisters of Mercy, with a heavy drumbeat and jangling guitar underpinning a moody, distorted baritone vocal.  While they don't break any new ground, they do their old school roots proud... music for dancing or moping, depending on your mood.  (His by-the-numbers cover of the Joy Division's classic "Transmission" could have been left off -- it's well-done, but doesn't really offer anything new).

In the beginning, nobody who owned a Siouxie and the Banshees album would be caught dead listening to Duran Duran or Flock of Seagulls.  Today "synthpop" has become a staple at many "Goth" clubs, and "80s nostalgia" may include Billy Idol or Dexy's Midnight Runners alongside the Cruxshadows.  With "Bella Come Non Mai" and "Endless Time" Marconi captures that simultaneously wistful-and-bouncy mood which characterized so much of the best 80s pop.  It may not be great art, but it's certainly great fun... who could ask for more?

At first glance there's little in common between  "Gothic" and "Industrial" music: one might as well imagine a double bill of "Bram Stoker's Dracula" and "Tetsuo the Iron Man."  And yet the two have become associated forever by promoters and clubkiddies alike.  Marconi pays homage to industrial's hard-edged anger with "A.M.I.P" and "Samurai (Version II)," giving us a not-so-skinny puppy that manages to be hard without being too challenging.  I was more interested, honestly, by the opening "A Joke," a brief dissonant piano interlude which reminded me of Pierre Boulez.  Perhaps Marconi should expand his horizons by
exploring some modern classical and avant-garde performers.  Schoenberg's experiments with serialism or Edgar Varese's sonic compositions could provide great inspiration for more challenging and interesting work on his part.

Overall Marconi seems to be a musician in search of his voice.  This isn't a bad thing by any means: every artist goes through a period where he does what Robert Louis Stevenson called "playing the sedulous ape."  He's certainly got the enthusiasm, and he appears to know his sources well.  It's not a bad album -- it's always listenable and frequently danceable -- but neither is it a particularly original one.  Right now it's  good juvenilia; one of those early works which may well wind up a collector's edition when Marconi hits his stride and becomes a musical leader, not just a talented follower.
 

1) A Joke
2) Prayers
3) Bella Come Non Mai
4) Space Trip
5) Endless Time
6) Chances
7) Krime 3
8) Monica
9) In a Dark Place
10) A.M.I.P.
11) Samurai (Version II)
12) Transmission
13) Autumn Waltz
14) Giovedi 17
15) Jody Played Guitar

Band Website: http://www.thesand.net/csalva/index.html
 

Swann Danger
Swann Danger EP
~reviewed by Matthew

Swann Danger is a morose musical duo from Oakland, California, and their debut EP is a brilliant effort that tactfully revitalizes traditional elements of Gothic Rock and Post Punk.  The band’s immediate strength is without question the commanding and charismatic vocals of Cynthia Mansourian, who is as equally gifted with her guitar as she is with her mic.
 
Her strong alto is a dead ringer for Siouxsie Sioux, and even this early in their career, I am willing to bet that the Siouxsie comparisons are already wearing thin on Cynthia and her accomplice Andy Zevallos.  But regardless of how great a faux pas it is for us critics to make band comparisons, the average listener will not only notice the similarity to the Banshees, but will take great delight in it.  This is one of Swann Danger’s key selling points for fans of classic Goth.  Furthermore, Swann Danger seems to have been weaned on the more ‘evil’ and anxiety laden days of early “Join Hands” and “Juju” era Banshees.  (What, do you think Siouxsie is considered Gothic because of freakin’ “Cities In Dust” -- Please!  Check out “Eve White/Eve Black” and then get back to me).  The Banshees lingered in this oppressive and suffocating territory for only a few albums and B-sides, and Swann Danger directly pick up right where they left off and bring the claustrophobic lugubriousness to a new generation.  And goddamnit, it’s utterly fantastic.

Each and every one of the five plodding tracks on this exceptionally well-produced independent release are masterful dirges and immediately chill the blood.  The EP unfolds menacingly enough with the dry punchy percussion and delayed bass lines of “Motion To Bliss.”  Cynthia’s demanding voice appears strong and unwavering, chanting the lyrics to the first verse before an unexpected and superbly bleak wash of rumbling guitar noise casts a murky shroud across your speakers and scares the bejesus right the fuck out of you.   This song demands to be blasted at unhealthy volumes, and in so doing, Cynthia’s sonic guitar effects will cause the hairs on the back of your neck to stand icily on end.  I am not entirely sure I have heard a Goth Rock band utilize such dark chord progressions – the tone of the guitar has a familiar kind of overdriven feedback, drenched in delay effects, and it drones on eerily while the exceptionally well executed drum loop pounds behind.  Cynthia’s voice acquires a greater sense of frenzy as each dizzying note spirals into a further abyss.  Of course I sound overdramatic, but this song is just so bloody intense.  It’s musical theatre without the pretense.  It’s simple, direct, stark and minimalist – but these two folks alone make a great deal of noise (and I am guessing with minimal overdubbing).

And that was just the first track.  Which is admittedly, in my opinion, the strongest song on the EP.   What follows however is only slightly trumped by the majesty of the opening cut.  “Blood And Glory” is a more teasing and impish in its rhythms and Cynthia’s vocal pacing.  It is easily the catchiest songs on the disc, with its manic shuffle and buzzing guitar harmonics.  We could throw out a comparison to the debut Xmal Deutschland release, but it would probably be lost on most readers.  So we move on.  “All Is Forgiven” opens with an eerie disjointed collage of sound, before a hefty bass line sneaks in to be joined by more soaring skin-crawling guitar.   A similar brand of the frigid creepiness employed on “Motion To Bliss” is apparent in this track, but the effect is more drawn out and hypnotic with the repetitive stalling rhythms and lumbering bass lines.

Three tracks into the CD and Swann Danger still lurch along at an uncompromisingly sluggish pace, emphasizing the claustrophobic kind of darkness found in the Goth of yesterday.   Smartly, the band is entirely disinterested in club accessibility, and instead opt for more severe and unsettling sound scapes that invoke a feeling not unlike being buried alive. And can you imagine, for a moment, what it would be like to lie in the earth?  When the worms start crawling upon you, and you go to scream but your mouth fills up with the rotten soil and you begin to choke to death?   “You Have Won” captures that kind of neurotic Poe-eque discomfort beautifully – with its lackadaisical bass line, spidery guitar punctuations, and unsettling lyrical imagery.  “Down in the dirt where there is no fun / follow me there cause you have won / under the water the air comes undone / pillow my face and we’re down…down…listening close to the sound unwound / follow me there ‘cause you won.”

The final track “The Now Is Mine” features the most experimental rhythm structures, and consequently, it is one of the few moments on the EP where you can actually tell that the drums are not man made.  Nonetheless, it’s still an enthralling track, with Cynthia’s voice soaring above the awkward tribal percussion and ominous bass and guitar effects.  The doom never lets up, the light never manages to leak through the cracks, and this misanthropic music fan pledges eternal allegiance to Swann Danger.

Hopefully, this isn’t the last we will hear from Swann Danger.  I can imagine how maybe a adding a dash of punk and maybe thrashing out for a moment or two could add to the band’s dynamics and secure them an even broader appeal with Death Rockers and old school fans.  However, I personally dig the oozing pace and density found on this disc and I think most like-minded folks will appreciate it as well.  Whatever the case, this is a spirited revival of what dark Post Punk and Goth was once all about and this EP is unquestionably essential.  Elitists unite!  Contact Cynthia via the website below and add this stark mercurial masterpiece to your collection at once!

Track List:
1.) Motion To Bliss
2.) Blood And Glory
3.) All Is Forgiven
4.) You Have Won
5.) The Now Is Mine

Swann Danger is:
Cynthia Mansourian: vocals, guitar
Andy Zevallos: bass, sampler, and drum machine

Swann Danger – Official Site:
http://www.swanndanger.com

Terror Organ
The Stalag Symphony
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

As I always say (or at least, plan to say more in the future once I've said it for the first time here), when in doubt, look at the press sheet. I listened to Terror Organ, and thought, 'hey, that's not music. That's not music at all.' So I checked the press sheet, which says that Terror Organ provides "over 40 minutes of sonic industrial nightmares meets haunting melodies. Power electronics meets Black metal is what I think comes closes (sic) to this." Let me refine that description slightly: "over 40 minutes of static, sirens, vomiting, and noise, recorded in a trash compactor at a junkyard, meets intolerable crap."

We all have a line that we draw between what we consider music, and what we consider non-musical garbage. It's a handy line, and I treasure mine dearly. I deploy it all the time in the defense of strange IDM or ambient music that pushes the boundaries of 'music'. Terror Organ doesn't make the cut for me. They're not only on the wrong side of the line, they're operating at the precise opposite end of the spectrum of what I consider music, and for me, that's a pretty broad definition that can even include Merzbow and V/VM.

To give examples, "Strength is Beauty" is an 8 minute er... what do you call a song that isn't a song? An 8 minute piece of crap that has a persistent static sound and background siren, with the addition of poorly performed black metal rasps. "Frontal Lobe Castration" features a sample of a very dated Little Red Riding Hood song with a flute and a silly 'old cartoon' style singer (this is the only point on the CD in which melody is present, and it's not, for the record, haunting). The final track has a woman speaking incantations of the Scarcely Audible variety that likely damn the listener to hell. And if they don't damn the listener, you'll still feel like you're in hell listening to this rotten CD.

There is a dearth of listeners who would be interested in random noise with occasional samples and vocals, or 8 minutes of the same siren wail. Although Terror Organ has succeeded in creating a unique and bizarre atmosphere with The Stalag Symphony, virtually any no-talent hack could put together looping electronic fuzz and crumpling paper sounds with sirens. Maybe Pete and Lea Helmkamp are geniuses, but there's simply no way to judge it this far outside the realm of music, and we're left to subjectively assess just how much we enjoy painful noise. I can't take anymore. If you can, perhaps if you're a fan of other Dragon Flight Recordings artists, you'll find plenty of painful noise here.
 

Track List:
1) Salvations Succumb to Rust
2) Mindlock (Septic Utopia)
3) Frontal Lobe Castration
4) Nihil Transmission
5) Strength is Beauty
6) Mourning Tsar

Terror Organ is:
Pete Helmkamp - bass/vocals/keyboards/soundscaping
Lea Helmkamp - 8 string bass/drum machine/keyboards/vocals/soundscaping

Terror Organ - Official Site:
http://www.holyterror.com/terrororgan/

Dragon Flight Recordings:
http://www.dragonflightrec.org/

Theatres des Vampires
Vampyrisme
~reviewed by Goat

Yanno what's sad to me?  Is when an album has to be sold, or thinks it has to be sold by little things like, "Featuring ex-Cradle of Filth" and "Featuring blah blah from Christian Death".  So, that's one sad thing about this album right off the bat, (scuse the pun,) cause I think to myself, "What's wrong with the music that it has to attach itself to its exes?"

So, with that in mind, I decided to sail forth into the music *pretending* I didn't know about the former lives and undertakings (the puns are getting really bad,) of the band members.  The music plays.  I let myself
fall into it.  I stare at the speakers.  "This sounds like bad Cradle of Filth," I say to the big black woofers and tweeters.  The music plays on. I think of Rikk Agnew and Rozz Williams.  I try to imagine the looks on their faces as they listen to this.  I think Rikk would be making rude jokes about the band names, (Gabriel Blasfemator, Fabian Necros, Zimon Blutsauger, etc.,) and I'm not sure what Rozz would be doing.  Probably his nails.

The thing is, the is the same old same old, and it's been done better and with more passion long ago, and more recently by some of the "exes" listed on the promo material.  Now I can see why the "Featuring" stuff is important.  Even if you're new to the whole idea of vampires and all that, I cannot help but direct you to the OLD Christian Death stuff, before Valor came along, and to the zillions and quadrillions of other "vampire" bands that existed and exist in their wake.  Or, if you want something more metally and glamorous, fall face first into Cradle of Filth, or, what the heck, King Diamond circa "Voodoo".  Only bring this into your life if you can get it for cheap or free, and even then, you might find yourself hanging it in your kitchen window as a sun, er, moon-catcher.

By the way.  The "featured musicians" only appear in two "bonus tracks" at the very end of the album.  One begins to wonder if these people were used-car salesmen in former lives...

Track Listing:
-Vampyrisme
-Twilight
-Beyond the Forest
-In the wood
-Ancient Damned
-Woods of Walaccia, Part 1
-The Dark Domain
-Walpurga's night
-The Snow Turns Red
-The Impaler

Bonus:
Kingdom of Vampires
The enchanted forest
Lucretia
Lacrima Christi

Beyond Productions/Masterpiece Productions
http://www.beyondprod.com
http://www.masterpiecedistribution.com

Theatres des Vampires:
http://www.theatres-des-vampires.com/

The Way of All Flesh
3 Songs (TWOAF)
~reviewed by Mick Mercer

Interesting three tracks from the Sheffield fourpiece who do the right thing and announce themselves as UNASHAMED GOTHIC ROCK. (Full marks!) And although they look old school and mention Mission, Sisters, Nephilim and (odds ones out) Bauhaus, this isn't entirely the case. Yes, I tended to know what they were going to do next before it emerged, so they do have a fairly orthodox habits, but apart from the final track, they're fairly spry.

Clear, and without bombast, they set slow atmospherics in place for 'Final Resolve', with some damn fine wiggly percussion, which remains one of these greatest traits. They have a way with rhythm, to keep your interest perky, and this stealth offsets the slightly chintzy dated guitar here, while Redford's attractively mild vocals also command respect, although by being less than belligerent it does mean the guitars are held down in the mix or he'd be swamped. It's a bright, workable sound.

It gets better in 'Andromeda' despite vocals being hard to distinguish at times, so they do mess about, and when it kicks off it does in a spirited fashion. They have a real feel for space, and it gives the song a second wind as the guitar fizzes and whisks about.

Then they rather drown their charm with 'So Cold' which is overlong, with bleaty/droney vocals and the bass seems rather bobbley when left exposed but it does settle down with the vocals overheating while swinging capriciously atop an elegant guitar hammock. In truth, that last song is nowhere near as good as the others and either needs radical surgery or a swift burial. A band with good ideas also needs common sense.

Try http://www.twoaf.com for the info on a good website.
 

Thou Shalt Not
The White Beyond (Dancing Ferret)
~reviewed by Mick Mercer

OOOH, LUXURY! Considering some of the Dancing Ferret stable, this is a bright alternative, who don't do quite what you expect. They have an opulent melodic ambition, and simply go crazy with their agile, slippery lyrics capering brightly across glittery music, and it's definitely electric pop rather than electro, for all their programming capabilities. It isn't challenging any rock territories, because the vocals rule the roost, and the vocals really waltz provocatively with the melodies, which is a sure sign of finesse.

It's 80's based, from the left-field side of activities, where the post-New Romantic era vanquished turgid shite like Visage and allowed people to speed ahead of the simplistic urges of Soft Cell. A time when Depeche Mode were struggling into ill-fitting voluminous leather trousers which would have been better used on sofas, and where Japan lost their edge. More than anything, Thou Shalt Not occupy the same exultant high-minded ground which once so suited Heaven 17.

So what's not to like? Well, it's visible in the song titles for a start. It's a grand conceit, and that's only a step away from deceit in my eyes, and in this case it's self-deception, because by being so knowing, so clever, for all their flowing qualities, they've shafted themselves and made a delightfully modern album, but minus any thrills.

It's a little too polished, particularly when their photos show the singer in a kilt and studded belt. There are more than bulging brains here but I expected a bit more human straining, of vocal anguish or musical honesty, the very essence of artistry. Instead we get them providing the immaculate consumption, with little more than jaunty frills around almost painfully prosaic words, which at times get so grandiloquent they make no sense whatsoever, apart from to themselves. By being over-illustrative they are an abstract jumble, seemingly profound, but really little more than artifice.

What it lacks in abundance is a thoughtful feel being transmitted, because it's like the composition showcase equivalent of an interior design magazine. It's also never outright poppy, which is something aesthetes rarely manage successfully, but it has a lovely languid atmosphere, and makes for a restful change from much of the mania of the electronic bands, which is why I can recommend it to anyone who goes for that. A sorbet for the corrosively inclined.

The real sign that they have quality worth following is reserved for their final two songs (ignoring 'Breathe Again' which is a serene closing doodle) for the spaces suddenly open out, allowing the vocals to sound genuinely real, and the power of these songs, with rather more graceful and stark music, is a refreshing jolt after the soporific effect of the main bulk of their songs.

They've got something, and when they've done showing off I'm sure they will create future glories, providing they heed the main message. Less is more.

INSIDE OF YOU, IN SPITE OF YOU
CARDINAL DIRECTIONS
COME A TIME
WE COULD HAVE FLOWN LIKE POLLEN
THE OCEAN IS YOUR VOICE
GLACIERS
100 GENERATIONS
THE INSISTENCE OF SOLID FLOORS
G.L.M.
TRIAL BY FIRE
SONG FOR THE DYING
THE WHITE BEYOND
BREATHE AGAIN

Official Site:
http://www.thoushalt.net

Dancing Ferret:
http://www.ferret.com/discs
 

T.O.Y.
White Lights (e-Wave)
~reviewed by Uncle Nemesis

You’d never guess from this ultra-commercial, ultra-mainstream release that T.O.Y. once traded under the name of Evil’s Toy, and in that guise created hard-hitting electro-industrial sounds for the cyber generation. Well, times have certainly changed. These days, T.O.Y. make an inoffensive variety of mid-tempo MOR dance music, as meticulously polished as a diamond, as smooth as semolina, as blandly anonymous as a Nissan Cherry.  Frankly, I find it all rather boring. I’m equally sure the band will enjoy huge commercial success. Which, of course, is the whole point. It’s pop stardom or bust for these guys, now.

All the songs here are essentially constructed to the same blueprint - the same steady-as-she-goes beat, seldom straying far from a club-friendly 130bpm, the same lush, sweeping synth chords, the same chitter-chatter fills, the same deadpan vocals, multi-tracked here and there in an effort to keep things interesting. There are one or two moments when I think T.O.Y. are going to go off on an intriguing tangent - ‘Long Distance Ride’ works fairly well as a luxury-limousine counterpart to Kraftwerk’s stark, minimalist ‘Autobahn’, for example - but in the end T.O.Y. can never quite bring themselves to throw off their safety belts and give us a little danger. This is safe music for safe people.

I suppose this amounts to a further example of how the electronic underground in Germany is steadily re-inventing itself as the mainstream pop of the twenty-first century. Polish it up, smooth it out, and daytime radio playlists and high chart positions will surely follow. It’s significant that the press release which accompanies this CD starts off not by talking about T.O.Y. themselves, but by praising Wolfsheim for breaking into the top 10 of the German charts: ‘...holding out even against international super acts like Pink and Robbie Williams’. That’s very much the area T.O.Y. see themselves moving into these days - along with many other erstwhile ‘alternative’ acts, no doubt.

I hold no grudge against T.O.Y. - or indeed any other band - for making these moves towards the mainstream. Good luck to all and sundry, is what I say. I wish it were possible to make a similar transition in the UK, but...well, our music industry and media is different, and the alternative-to-mainstream path is, alas, blocked for our bands. I’m just a little disappointed that, as part of the mainstream-makeover process, the music always seems to suffer.

Ultimately, this is bland, safe pop, with everything exciting, awkward, quirky or just plain interesting ruthlessly ironed out in the quest for heavy rotation on housewife-friendly radio shows, chart action and pop stardom. Good luck, gentlemen - but I’m afraid I won’t be joining you on this particular long distance ride.

The tunestack:
Fly Away!
Beyond Sleep
White Lights
The Sky Is The Limit
Long Distance Ride
Fairytale
Charisma, She Said
The Liquid Circle
Two Souls
Inner Cinema
Just You And Me
Another Lovesong

The players:
Volker Lutz: Vocals, compositions, production
Oliver Taranczewski: Lyrics, live keyboards

The website: http://www.toy-music.com

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis: http://www.nemesis.to

Unveiled
Anti-God Behavior
~reviewed by Goat

This is so strange.  I'm sitting here listening to this cd, and it's dark metal that's all about, well, "Anti-God behavior", and I keep thinking of the strange English 80s band, XTC.  You know, "Generals and majors uh huh, are never too far..." etc.  There's something about the guitar work in this album, and the kitschy-ness of the blasphemy that remind me unceasingly of the band that gave us "Dear God, hope ya got the letter 'cause your name's on a lot of quotes in this booook..."

Now, to be fair, this is pure metal.  Totally technically sound, very fast, very proficient.  I will say with all sincerity that it's very well done.  The musicians who call themselves "Mr. Impure" (guitar,) "Infection" (guitars, vocals, bass,) and "Gorath" (drums) obviously know what they hell they're doing, and know their way around their instrument(s) of choice.  The thing is, even after several listens I just can't get any FEELING from this.  It's rather like watching a metronome click clock back and forth.  It's correct. It's right on time.  It's precise and without the slovenly horrors that sometimes find their way into "dark" metal music; poor production, poor musicianship, insultingly juvenile lyrics. None of those things are present here, but there is no soul, no passion that reaches out and grabs me and lets me know if I don't listen it'll strangle me in my sleep.  It's done right, and well, and it's boring.  If this is the most Anti-God behavior that Unveiled can come up with, I can pretty much assure that God doesn't really care.  I gotta go dig out that XTC album...

Track Listing:
-Lifespan Ill-fated
-Mockery of Life (All Hail Suicide)
-Composer of Blood-Opera
-Ruin of Virtue
-Mighty Death Experience
-Anti-God Behavior
-Rapture In Revolt
-Dreamworld Inferno

Woodcut Records
http://www.woodcutrecords.com
Unveiled:
http://unveiled.cjb.net/
 

vehume
In For The Kill
~reviewed by Goat

Sigh.  This would be a great album, if I could hear the vocals. But, I can't.  So, it's just an okay album with some really excellent mindbending musicianship on it, all of which is wasted because it wasn't mixed correctly.  It's a tragedy really, because from what I can hear of the vocals, they're absolutely some of the best death metal vocals ever screeched and howled.  Those Chris Barnes fans who always tell me that Barnes has THE largest death metal vocal range should get a load of this guy, or these guys, whichever it may be. If it's two of them, then screw me I'm totally wrong, but either way, the variation between and interplay of the highest-range death metal screeches possible, with the sickest low growls possible, is invigorating, breathtaking, everything death metal can and should be.

Like I said though, the vocals are almost totally lost in the @#%$ing amazingly brutal musicianship, but dammit, I  WANT TO HEAR THE VOCALS TOO!  I hope to whatever demons or gods were in charge of the recording sessions, that this problem may somehow be dealt with on a re-release, or that on future albums, the total and complete brilliance of this band will be given a full spectrum of inclusion on the recordings.  Listening to this is heartbreaking at times.  It's not until about the fifth song that the vocals are not entirely lost in the mix, and after that, the production varies between either allowing the vocals to shine through just enough to barely give them half a chance, to burying them completely again.  I've adjusted the equalizer, I've tried different headphones, I've done everything.  It's a damned shame.  This is probably one of the single most brutal and extreme death metal albums ever made, and they freakin' Spinal Tapped the damned thing.

Track Listing:
-Incineration of the body by own will
-Process to Decelerate
-Inhume
-Genetic Intervention
-Prelude to Human Confinement
-Scourging
-In For The Kill
-Decimated Content
-Ignorance of the Elevated
-Bitch Redecoration
-Bowel Movement
-Profound Presumption
-Fucked With Paranoia
-Blood Orgy at 7th Street
-Sodomizing Encounter
-Retreat From Morality

Osmose Productions
http://www.osmoseproductions.com
Inhume Website: http://www.inhume.nl/
 

Velvet Acid Christ
Hex Angel: (Utopia - Dystopia)
~reviewed by Dibrom

There comes a point at which you have to wonder what the hell the purpose behind something is, and why you should honestly bother to be interested.  I think the new VAC is one of these cases.  I suppose it would befit me to at least clarify my loath attitude, instead of just saying "fuck this", or "this sucks and is dumb as shit", though I honestly do wonder whether it would make much of a difference either way, given the context and how trendy flippant apathy is in music these days.

To be specific, what I am annoyed with is, to invoke a cliche, the state of music, the scene, or whatever you want to call it these days.  The new VAC exemplifies this in its novel contradictions and arbitrary nonsense, both in implicit theme and in the approach of the music's creator.  I wont pretend to be an expert on VAC and explicitly detail its regression over time, though I have followed most of the releases and have become increasingly averse to each one. Utopia Dystopia is no exception.

Regarding the music of this new release, we basically have the same approach as before: A "dark" electronic exploration into "evilness", and clever usage of samples to otherwise bolster what would probably be a rather shallow and uneventful, parroted message.  The problem is that the samples are now tired, the message is boring, and the whole image has become cheesy and superficial.  The rather directionless, uninspired, and just generally canned beat-driven-and-synth-pad sound certainly does help any of this.

The essence of the release can basically be understood as a mishmashed clusterfuck of "disturbing", "insightful", and "shocking" elements which, I suppose, are supposed to be compelling, but instead seem to me to only come across as childish, uninformed, and utterly uninteresting ranting -- ranting from someone who doesn't really have anything to say even, but is nonetheless trying very hard.  All the elements are here:  The "evil" album art with the "scary" and "disturbed" abstract images; the classic liner notes with all the bullshit about evil megacorps, religion, and the ubiquitous "fuck someone" (in this case just about everyone); the "angry" lyrics; and of course the samples demonstrating "oh such disparity!"

What's the point? Oh, right -- I guess during all of the pretense, the point was kind of lost.  Why bother?  Good question.  I suppose if you like to entertain yourself listening to weak apathetic drivel under the guise of "good music", it might be worth bothering for.  As for me, I'll spend my time listening to something else.

Track List:

1)  Haunted
2)  Collapsed
3)  Pretty Toy
4)  Hypoxia
5)  Misery
6)  East (meaningless Life mix)
7)  Dead Tomorrow
8)  Convex
9)  Eva
10) Crawl
11) Exit (Diseased World)

Velvet Acid Christ is:
Bryan Erickson

Velvet Acid Christ - Official Site:
http://www.the-revolution.net/vac/

Metropolis Records:
http://www.metropolis-records.com/
 

Venetian Snares
Find Candace
~reviewed by Goat

Don't plan on having much of your head left when you're done listening to this. If it were possible to squish an electric egg-beater cake-mixer thingy through your temple and then turn it on "random", this is pretty much what you'd get. What? You're musically meandering along in a happy and peaceful manner? What? You forgot you had a CD on, and you've been concentrating on that plastic model you were building? KA-BOOOOOM!!! Ah, yes, that was a Venetian Snares album you had on. Never let yourself get comfortable, or trust me, the bogey-man WILL jump out and get you!

I read someone recently describe music like this as "drill 'n' bass." Fantastic. Wish I'd thought've that. Definitely buy this album if you're looking for the sonic equivalent to an inner Brillo pad with machine-gun primer!

Distributed in the U.S. by:
http://www.soleilmoon.com

Venetian Snares site:
http://www.venetiansnares.com/

A nice interview with Aaron, worth spending a little of your time reading:
http://www.themilkfactory.co.uk/interviews/vsnaresiw.htm
 

Virus
Carheart
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

Occasionally you encounter a CD title so unabashedly stupid that you can't imagine what the band possibly intended in choosing it. Carheart is one such name. Remarkably, the music fits the title perfectly. Unfortunately... the music fits the title perfectly. Virus is a three-member "psych rock" band (read: Ved Buens Ende soundalike) featuring Czral, formerly of Ved Buens Ende.

Ok... so maybe it's not fair to blame Virus for being derivative of VBE. The larger problem is that VBE does not particularly appeal to people who don't enjoy loosely experimental, unaccomplished, unrefined, plodding, non-melodic music that's stuck on repeat at a mid-tempo pace. The previous description also applies to Virus. The press sheet notes that Carheart is "an exercise in eccentricity, an exorcism of the mundane - yet surprisingly catchy..." In fact, the reverse of each of those statements is true.

Bassist Plenum and guitarist Czral manage an occasional creative spark and get some kind of groove going, but for the most part they play constantly dissonant riffs that meander aimlessly at a slow tempo. There is absolutely nothing compelling about the music - the enduring dissonance wears thin before the third track ends, no speed exists to capture your attention, the drumming is bored and uninspired, and the offbeat clean vocals range from "mildly ok" to "comical" to "comically bad" (much like Ved Buens Ende, even though they had a different vocalist).

The songs do give off an overall feeling of road tripping to Crazy Land, but they do so in such a lethargic and unvaried fashion that you'll hatch a scheme to ditch the band at the next rest stop. Carheart is music for people who want an odd background soundtrack. Although the CD is being marketed as psychological or intellectual, you'll find it far more suited to cursory listens... it just doesn't have the depth to be entertaining in any other regard. But hey, if you enjoy randomly assembled dissonance straight from the minds of the mentally ill, I don't know what else I could recommend.

Track List:
1) Something Furry This Way Comes
2) Carheart
3) Queen Of The Hi-Ace
4) Road
5) Gum Meet Mother
6) Dogs With Wheels
7) It's All Gone Weird
8) Kennel Crash Recovery
9) Hustler
10) Bandit
11) Be Elevator

Virus is:
Czral - guitar, voice
Plenum - bass
Esso - drums

Jester Records:
http://www.jester-records.com/

The End Records (US):
http://www.theendrecords.com/

Windir
Likferd
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

Windir has long been one of the great Viking metal bands, easily ranked alongside masters such as Mithotyn and Enslaved. But Viking metal has been in a bit of a slump lately. Groups like Forlorn and Thyrfing have cast aside their Viking sheathes and jumped into the realm of symphonic black metal (presumably so they can be cool like those Dimmu Borgir guys). Windir's Likferd is a much needed rejuvenation of the good ol' Viking sound, come at a time when I thought the style had long since sailed off in a makeshift pyre.

Likferd starts off with "Resurrection of the Wild", which is almost a direct response to the recent commercial leanings of other Viking groups. In addition to the implications of the title, the song opens up with a symphonic lead that could have been straight off of a recent Dimmu Borgir CD, only to morph into one hell of a groovy guitar variant on the same theme, as if to let the Viking-bands-turned-DB-clones know how it's done. The songs are packed with quality bass and guitar riffs, and the diversity in tempo and dynamics keeps every track distinct.

Much of Likferd follows suit, melding memorable keyboard themes and guitar leads with really groovy, fun, Odin-approved metal riffs. The well-placed, evocative clean chanting enhances the music a great deal, and reminds me a lot of Emperor. In some songs, namely "Blodssvik", the combination of nigh-futuristic keyboards and chugging riffs sounds like ...And Oceans. The rhythm section adds a heaviness and sense of purpose to the free-groovin' romp, and the raspy vocals are sure to scare off weak-willed nu-metal neophytes. The production admirably captures the sound, even allowing the bass to occasionally stand out.

I'd be lying if I said that Likferd was the most original CD I've come across, but Windir's potent brand of Viking metal is sounding fresh as ever. And it has come at a time when their contemporaries are dissolving or changing gears, so Windir is all the more welcome to kick out quality unoriginal songs in what is now a relatively barren genre. If you've liked past Windir or Mithotyn (and maybe even the more traditionally "Viking metal" output by Enslaved, Forlorn, and Thyrfing), then you can count Likferd as a must-have.

Track List:
1) Resurrection of the Wild
2) Martyrium
3) Despot
4) Blodssvik
5) Fagning
6) On the Mountain of Goats
7) Dauden
8) Aetti Morkna

Windir is:
VALFAR: Screams and additional instruments
HVÀLL:     Bass
STEINGRIM: Drums
STURE: Rhythm guitar
STROM: Lead guitar
RIGH: Synth

Windir - Official Site:
http://www.windir.no/

The End Records (US):
http://www.theendrecords.com/

Various Artists
Gotham Garage (Enoch)
~reviewed by UncleNemesis

Don't be fooled by the presence of the G-word. This is not a goth compilation. I'm tempted to remark that it's something much better than that - but for reasons of tact and diplomacy I will say no such thing. Except, erm, I think I just did. But you know how it is. Sometimes the goth scene and its fellow travellers can try a man's patience. Sometimes, I feel like I just don't want to know about the latest crop of bedroom-goth hopefuls, identikit deathrockers, imagination-free stomp-and-rant industrialists, and blandly upbeat EBM merchants, all dutifully toeing their chosen generic line, all making polite and ultimately timid music for their chosen market sector. Sometimes I just want to shout 'Enough!', throw the whole caboodle out of the window, and start again with some music that has a bit of genuine life-force to it.

Which is where this compilation comes in. This is a collection of scuzzy, lo-fi, ramshackle garage-punk outfits from NYC and the north-eastern corner of the USA generally. Seventeen bands and seventeen tracks of clattering, battering, freaked-out, fuzzed-out, rock 'n' roll glory. Note, if you will, the phrase 'garage-punk'. Because these bands are not punks in the mohawks-and-bondage-trousers sense. We're in a different area here, somewhere in that ill-defined zone between such masters of 60s freakery as The Standells and the The Count Five, and latter-day exponents of the stripped-down garage sound such as the Barracudas and the Ramones. If any of those names made you sit up and take notice, you need this album.

There's not a song here that misses the mark. They all come out kicking. The Tie Reds open the show with 'Come On Let's Go', and the title says it all. As noisy as a subway train, a brash call to hedonistic arms - and it's even got 'ooo-OOO-ooo' backing vocals. How, I ask you, can you fail to love a song which features ooo-OOO-ooo backing vocals? 'Hotel Motel' by Baby Strange is a series of staccato explosions and a vocal for which the epithet 'snotty' could have been specially coined. A bad-attitude classic. 'Fuheezy' by The Taste contains incomprehensible slang ('Get your fuheezy on' - er, yeah, why not?) and an entirely wonderful ice cream van organ sound. Charm School's 'Trust Fund' has a Holidays In The Sun-style riff and a vocal that sounds like a stroppy Shirley Temple, after she's been sent up to her room without any tea. 'Good To You' by The Improbables is a fuzzed-out sixties thing, like an early Stones track gone ludicrously manic.

The Pale Imitations have the best band name on the album, and, in 'The Girl I Want', a song based around a towering riff and some frenzied shouting. Just the essentials, then - but sometimes, that's all you need. The Tampoffs play it fast and loud, but someone's forgotten to push up the vocal fader - the track is an exhilarating rush of guitar and drums, but where are the vocals? The Swains donate a live recording of 'You Lied' - it's a song entirely in thrall to the Mighty Fuzz, and therefore a good old blast of ear-clearing noise. Subtlety? Nope, sorry, we don't stock that stuff around here.

There's a change of pace after all the fast stuff, as Thee Minks slink into view with 'I Lie To Boys' - which has got to be the best song title on the album. The song itself is a low-slung, bile-soaked ballad, the girls cruising past in their hot rod, giving the boys on the corner the finger. And then Dementia Thirteen crank it all up again with 'Sell Your Soul', a track which sounds like theme music for rock 'n' roll astronauts. Muck And The Mires bring 'Doreen' to the party, surely the first time that particular name has been immortalised in song. By the sound of it, Doreen's pretty keen on that early Kinks sound. The Fever wallop out 'Bridge And Tunnel' - a wired, angular, smash-and-grab raid on the no-wave. 'Here's To You' by The Drossells is an absurdly catchy pop number; you could almost imagine Belinda Carlisle taking a cleaned-up, guitar-free version into the charts. Hmm. On the other hand, let's imagine no such thing. Oh, dig the crazy sax on this one, by the way.

The Demands throw in 'All Right', and again its a classic slice of pop - you could almost imagine this one being done by pre-superstar Blondie. 'Cryin' In The Night' by The Downbeat Five has a ripped-up caterwaul for a vocal, and a splendid slashed-out riff which doesn't particularly see why it should stray too far from its favourite chord. 'Don't Wantchoo No Mo' by The Recruders, as you might guess from the title, is an energetic take on that early-Stones version of the blues - except the Stones never stepped on the gas to quite this extent. Nor, unless I'm mistaken, did poor old Bill Wyman ever venture in the direction of a bass solo.

The final track, 'One Eye Open' by The Konks, is all clanging guitars and lunatic, screeching vocals, buried deep in overheated valve distortion. It's an exhilarating noise, but the best part of the track comes when the guitarist suddenly stops playing. 'Keep going!' shouts the singer. 'I broke a string,' comes the guitarist's voice. 'You should've kept going anyway!' remonstrates the singer. 'But I broke the string that I needed,' explains the guitarist, doggedly keeping the muso-flag flying. 'So what?' says the singer - and then the band all pile in, giving the song a big, bashed-out finish, and to hell with broken strings.

As a neat summing-up of the prevailing attitude right across this album, that little studio vignette can't be bettered. Punk, as if we were ever in any doubt, is not dead. It's alive and well, rampaging around with a gloriously brattish energy, and probably gigging all over NYC even as I type. This album restored my battered faith in rock 'n' roll - give it a chance, and I'll wager it'll do the same for you.

The tunestack:

The Tie Reds - Come On Let's Go [No band website: check this Mp3 page on the Dot Dash site] http://www.dotdashnyc.com/sounds.html
Baby Strange - Hotel Motel http://www.babystrange.com
The Taste - Fuheezy http://www.geocities.com/thebeatofthetaste
Charm School - Trust Fund http://www.charmschoolnyc.com
The Improbables - Good To You http://www.theimprobables.net
The Pale Imitations - The Girl I Want http://www.panticopter.com/pi
The Tampoffs - All The Time http://www.mysterykitchen.net/tampoffs
The Swains - You Lied http://metatronics.net/swains
Thee Minks - I Lie To Boys http://www.theeminks.com
Dementia Thirteen - Sell Your Soul http://www.dementia13.com
Muck And The Mires - Doreen http://www.muckandthemires.com
The Fever - Bridge And Tunnel http://www.thefeveronline.com
The Drossells - Here's To You http://www.thedrossells.com
The Demands - All Right http://www.mp3.com/The_Demands
The Downbeat Five - Cryin' In The Night http://www.downbeat5.com
The Recruders - Don't Wantchoo No Mo http://www.surf.to/recruders
The Konks - One Eye Open http://www.thekonks.com

Enoch Records website: http://www.enochrecords.com

The Dot Dash website - an all-purpose resource for NYC garage, punk, and rock 'n' roll: http://www.dotdashnyc.com

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis:  http://www.nemesis.to

Various Artists - Promosampler
Karmakosmetix
~reviewed by Eric Rasmussen

So... one day this innocent looking bright red promo sampler decided to visit my home. It seemed nice enough. It came with a cover letter asking if I would review it. "Sure," I thought, naively, "how hard could that be." After listening to it once, I was immediately struck with one pervasive and poignant thought: "Holy crap." Karmakosmetix is a record label filled to the brim with weird Norwegian musicians who make very weird music that will make you feel weird and say holy crap.

Now, when I say holy crap, I'm not by any means saying the music is crap. In fact, a lot of it is quite spectacular, and what few songs failed to grab me nevertheless tugged at my sensibilities and saturated my ears with interesting (and weird) sounds. stille opprør, oddvar a:m and several other groups pick up not too far from where the infamous In The Woods... left off, and this is not a surprising fact given that many of the ITW band members are involved in projects on Karmakosmetix (in fact, this compilation also comes free with the ITW's farewell live CD).

I can handle ITW style experimental metal, but I was totally unprepared for Norwegian rap (mc 14-tiss and mc blaud konsonant), country (egil s. olsen) or weird 60's-ish but kinda Radioheady folk stuff (knut h. lind and huge brown). I also can't rightly say I was prepared for electronica with a comic spoken voice that is eminently weird (plutho). I first tried listening to the compilation as a whole, and found that it lacked in coherency ("obviously," you may say), but in judging the songs individually I found a considerable amount of them fascinating, and this is a fine compilation for weirdos (like me).

This promosampler gives the impression that the musicians of Kristiansand, Norway inhabit a village of huts and teepees near a cold and barren forest by a smoldering highway with tumbleweeds and boots. 25% of the villagers wear cowboy hats, 5% have sagging pants, 2% are nervous, twitchy stand-up comedians who don't tell jokes, 75% are completely out of their mind on very heavy drugs, and 100% know how to play at least one instrument in such a way as to make you just as uncomfortable or uneasy as they are. If you like CDs that inspire strong reactions, you have to get this compilation and revel in its unmatched craziness. Plus, it'll provide a nice intro to unheard of artists, many of whom will soon design full CDs (lord help us all).

Track List:
1&2) stille opprør - so2
3) oddvar a:m - one world
4) egil s. olsen - highwayman
5) black bone chapel - i can cry
6) soXpan - badass
7) huge brown - death of a child
8) this boys band - i'll make you understand
9) x:botteri - crying in the chapel
10) nærvær - to plan, strofe zwei
11) plutho - one million questions
12) roger m - reason why
13) eliz.. - counting thought
14) transit - the girl and the road
15) mc 14-tiss + mc blaud konsonant  - sørlandet
16) knut h. lind - hope

Karmakosmetix:
http://www.karmakosmetix.com/

The End Records (US distribution):
http://www.theendrecords.com/
 

Various Artists
Kains Kinder (UpScene)
~reviewed by Uncle Nemeis

This is a compilation with a difference. It features an array of bands which, between them, represent a broad cross-section of the current dark-alternative (ghastly expression, but you know what I mean) scene in Germany. Everyone from Umbra Et Imago to Das Ich, from Kiss The Blade to Absurd Minds is featured. But the intention behind this compilation is not simply to promote the bands, although it certainly serves that purpose well enough. The idea is to create something new, for none of the featured tracks are drawn from the bands' usual repertoires. All the songs are specially recorded for this release - and all feature lyrics by Martin Sprissler.

Now, if you don't happen to live in Germany, you'll probably be muttering 'Martin who?' at this point. My extensive research (ten minutes of intensive Googling) turned up many, many references to the man and his works on innumerable German-language websites, but there seems to be precisely no information about him anywhere on the web in English. I suspect this review is likely to become, by default, the number one English-language information source  for Martin Sprissler - which means I'd better get this right, then, hadn't I?

So, just who is this man of letters? As it happens, I have encountered Martin Sprissler's name before - but only in his day job, as it were, as publisher of the German goth-scene magazine Gothic. He's also known in Germany as a DJ and performance artist, and as a writer for German-language comics - and has published two books of what I can only assume is poetry. Martin Sprissler's own website, while listing the books themselves, gives no hint as to what they might contain. However, given that his latest project involves writing lyrics for bands to set to music, I reckon poetry is a pretty good bet.

Elsewhere on the website, I see that the the Kains Kinder project encompasses a video, DVD, book, soundtrack (although it's not made clear what this is a soundtrack to) - and this compilation. Which is where we came in. None of the foregoing explains, of course, exactly what the overall point or intention of the Kains Kinder project actually is - but that, I'm afraid, seems to be the common theme here. Lots of little snippets of information, but no way of getting a comprehensive overview. By default or design, Martin Sprissler remains an enigma.

So, given that I'm not *quite* sure what's going on here - I don't know if there's an over-arching concept, or any kind of story being told - let's just cut the crap, hit random play, and listen to the music. Much of which, it turns out, is keyboard-dominated stuff, ranging from the swooning synthpop balladry of Illuminate with 'Where Are You?' to minimalist art-synth workouts, as exemplified by 'High Society' by The Fair Sex, who create a kind of Hammer Horror take on Kraftwerk. The mood is frequently reflective, downbeat: the relatively few lively tracks, such as 'Brothers And Sisters' by Dorsetshire, stand out like carousing drunks at a memorial service. (Incidentally, I must note in passing that the thought of a band selecting a bucolic and agreeable English rural county as their name always amuses me. It's as if a British band called itself Uckermark and expected to get taken seriously in Germany).

Philip Boa (on this occasion credited as a solo artist, without his Voodo Club) gives us a close-to-mic, intimate, spoken-word take on 'Serenade des Abschieds', while some early-Yello style synth sequences judder in the background. Das Ich are as harsh and assertive as ever on 'Die Bewaffnung Hat Begonnen', and effortlessly take the award for Most Annoying Squeaky Synth Noise. Kiss The Blade wrap things up, and break the mood, with 'Gone Again', turning Martin Sprissler's words into a rousing slice of rowdy gothic rock.

But that's not quite the end. This particular edition of the compilation is a limited-edition double CD, containing a big value 25 tracks (the single CD version weighs in at an economical 17). So, we have another CD of music to dip into...

Tilo Wolff of Lacrimosa opens Disc 2 with 'Give Me Something To Believe In', a folk-rock ballad upon which his malt-vinegar voice emotes portentously over a frankly cheesy drum machine. The melody and general structure of the track sounds suspiciously like an old Lacrimosa song, 'Stolzes Herz' - I half suspect Tilo is recycling an old idea here. In any case, I'm not a fan of Lacrimosa, regarding the band as a kind of Monty Python parody of goth, and on this evidence I have to say that Tilo Wolff as a solo artist is not much of an improvement. Umbra Et Imago take care of track two -  they're are all drumbeats and spooky mad-scientist squawking on 'Actions Speak Louder Than Words'. Kiss The Blade return with 'Great Expectations', which sounds astonishingly like the sort of drum machine-driven 90s Brit-Goth that the likes of Vendemmian used to do a few years back. Crudeness continue the 90s gothic rock theme, sounding like a troupe of Carl McCoy's apprentices on 'Brothers And Sisters' (and, incidentally, vying with Dorsetshire for the Band Name Which Sounds Most Hilariously Foolish To English Speaking People award). The very last track - 'Die Brucke' - is credited to Bengsch/Herb, which I assume refers to two people rather than a band. It's a spoken-word thing, a warm, rich voice over lush, pastoral strings and keyboards. I'm sure it's very moving if you understand German, but, unable as I am to fathom out the meaning, to me it just ends up sounding like a chocolate advert.

So, as ever with various artist compilations, it's a bit of a mixed bag. There's good stuff here - and also a handful of clunkers. There are genuinely inventive and moving tracks, but also a few examples of will-this-do creative coasting. There are several tracks which undoubtedly work well in the context of the German scene, but which come across as pretentious, or just plain silly, when regarded from the irreverent, irony-to-the-fore British perspective. Above all, it's frustrating that I simply don't know what the overall intention behind this project is, or, indeed, exactly what Martin Sprissler has achieved in his career as a writer. Presumably he's well-known in Germany, and therefore doesn't see why he needs to explain himself, or put comprehensive information on his website - but there's a *world* out there, and it just seems foolish not to take every opportunity to positively engage with it.

File under: interesting, but what's it all about?

Tilo Wolff: Give Me Something To Believe In
Umbra Et Imago: Actions Speak Louder Than Words
Out Of Norm: Together & Dreaming (original)
RS Tube: Preacherous
Kiss The Blade: Great Expectations
Crudeness: Brothers And Sisters
Carpe Noctem: Serenade Of Goodbye (instrumental)
Bengsch/Herb: Die Brücke (original)

Martin Sprissler's website:  http://www.kains-kinder.de

Three completely different websites for Martin Sprissler's publishing venture, Gothic magazine. You decide which one is current!
http://www.gothic-magazine.com
http://www.gothic-magazine.de
http://www.gothic-magazin.de

Information/discography for the UpScene label, on the site of the label's distributor:
http://www.indigo.de/unser_programm/labels/296

Dorsetshire:  http://www.dorsetshire.com

Uckermark: http://www.guru.de/uckermark

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis: http://www.nemesis.to

Various Artists
Meltdown Magazine/Dancing Ferret compilation (Dancing Ferret Dics)
~reviewed by Uncle Nemesis

Chances are you won't find this CD in your local goth-product outlet - or, if you do, it won't be racked up in the CD section. This compilation is only available with the current issue of Meltdown magazine, the UK's foremost goth-culture publication. It's a good deal for both parties, of course - Dancing Ferret get to showcase their music to a few thousand UK goths who might not be familiar with much of the stuff on the label, while Meltdown gets to give away a freebie, which amounts to a nice circulation/publicity boost for the magazine.

This compilation gives us seven tracks from bands on the Dancing Ferret label itself, plus another six 'friends of Dancing Ferret' - artists who are not on the label itself, but who have been invited on board as special guests at the Dancing Ferret party. Let's go to the party ourselves...

The Cruxshadows, Dancing Ferret's flagship band these days, kick things off with 'Winterborn', one of the band's trademark EBM-with-guitars workouts, in which Rogue declaims the vocal as if someone's putting his soul through a wringer. It seems to me that The Cruxshadows have  taken a strategic decision to push their music in the direction of  high-drama EBM, doubtless with an eye on the large audiences VNV Nation and other bands of that ilk can command - even to the point of racking up the emotion-content of the vocal delivery in a distinctly VNV-like manner. Intriguingly, however, The Cruxshadows have avoided - so far! - the opprobrium that is often heaped upon EBM outfits by those who find this style of music simplistic, and the breast-beating emotional vocals which tend to go with it somewhat ersatz. It'll be interesting to see how far The Cruxshadows can take this direction before someone points out that the band are steadily mutating into a spiky-haired version of VNV Nation. Except, erm, I think I just did...

According to the blurb in Meltdown Magazine, Thou Shalt Not are 'recommended if you're a fan of the Pet Shop Boys'. Well, as it happens, I *am* a fan of the PSBs: there's something rather wonderful about their precise, controlled electropop coupled with those severe yet camp vocals. With their song 'Cardinal Directions'  Thou Shalt Not don't *quite* get there, unfortunately: the beats are busy to the point of being messy, while the vocals sound like they're running to catch up as the song clatters away like a bus pulling past a request stop. A stripped-down, simplified arrangement would have probably worked better.

I turn once more to the blurb in the magazine for some info on The Last Dance, who hold down the third slot here with 'Nightmares'. 'A brand new track from the US band who are busting to return to the UK', I read. I'm tempted to remark at this point that The Last Dance could return to the UK tomorrow if they'd only bring their asking price down to a level that reflects their relatively low UK-scene profile, but hey. This is not the place for *that* dissertation! This track is a richly produced excursion into dance-floor oriented rock: the guitars churn away in the mix, while the song is carried forward on sweeping washes of electronic colour. It's an effective combination, and the production is a clear step ahead of the previous two tracks. Dare I say it, The Last Dance sound *mature*: they know what they want to do with their music, and they obviously have the skills and the know-how to make it all happen. This is the sound of a band in control.

Now, if I'm not much mistaken, Behind The Scenes is a new(ish) band put together by an ex-member of The Merry Thoughts, who were, of course, famed throughout the land for sounding quite a lot like the Sisters. Well, 'Protection' is on an entirely different sonic tip, although as this is a remixed version I'm not entirely sure how much of what I'm hearing here is the work of the band or the remixer. It's all juddering beats and a catchy vocal line, like Mesh after too much coffee. If you like Mesh (or, indeed, coffee) you'll probably like this.

Paralysed Age give us 'Berenice', and suddenly we've moved away from the dancefloor zone and into the rock pit. This is a raw rock tune, pushed forward by an uncompromising, chugging, guitar. Weirdly, is sounds like someone tweaks the vocal fader down after the singer delivers his first line; the rest of the vocals are distinctly lower in the mix. Hum. Dramatic gothic rock that could do with a slightly steadier hand on the mixing desk, methinks.

My hippy detector starts bleeping urgently now, because the next track is entitled 'Faery Child'. There's something about that particular spelling of the F-word - 'Faery' - that strikes a chill into my old punk heart. The Dreamside (for it is they) deliver a slice of smooth-as-chocolate trip-rock with vocals that occasionally sound like Bjork having one of her funny turns. Not bad, actually, but it ain't 'Big Time Sensuality', and there are moments when I think that's what The Dreamside would like the track to be. Hell, *I'd* like it to be, because at least then it wouldn't be called 'Faery Child'!

Ego Likeness give us 'I Live On What's Left', and we seem to be sticking around in the trip-hop zone. Or, at least, this track has that bomp-bomp-chuck-chucka beat which seems to be everyone's shorthand for trip-hop these days. The song itself is actually a bit of a gem, a bleak and wistful ballad in which the vocals - intense, close to the mic, demanding your attention - sit rather oddly with the lush, warm, jazzy backing. I'm struck by the thought that Johnny Cash would've probably done a very fine version of this song, and made it into one of his raw, commanding solo numbers. It's a bit late to send him a demo tape now, of course, but I'd like to hear this song stripped right down to the bone by somebody.

We're now into the 'Friends of Dancing Ferret' section, and the label's best friend (at least, he has the first track in this sequence) is that wry and witty troubadour, Voltaire. 'When You're Evil' is an effortless masterpiece of a song, Voltaire declaiming the lyrics - a one-liner in every line - as if he's wowing the hoorays at a vaudeville theatre in the roaring twenties. Quite why Voltaire isn't a big star is a mystery - if he got a few gigs in the UK with the Tiger Lillies, for example, I'm sure he'd be feted by every broadsheet arts editor in Fleet Street. This song swaggers along with an insouciant confidence, which, frankly, outstrips almost everything else here. To be blunt, Voltaire sounds *professional* in a way that some of the bands here simply don't. Splendid stuff. I can even forgive his odd pronunciation of 'evil' which comes out, amusingly enough, as 'evole'. Ah, an evole - is that like a water vole...?

Bow Ever Down bring us back to reality with 'Glass Doll' - a slice of workaday 80s-influenced electro-dance with a frustratingly bedroom-quality production: the vocals sound like they were recorded through several layers of cotton wool and a feather mattress, and all the cod-dramatics of the vocalist can't push them forward - or, indeed, disguise the fact that this song is unencumbered by a surfeit of original ideas. This sounds like a demo track which, frankly, should not have been allowed past quality control.

Iris give us a remix of their track 'Unknown', and coming hard on the heels of Bow Ever Down's muffled, lo-fi effort the superiority of the production is immediately apparent. This is a bona-fide technopop anthem, and while technopop anthems are hardly rare these days, they do it well.

Tapping The Vein are relatively famous, I gather. At any rate, they've toured the UK with Paradise Lost, if that counts for anything these days. 'Beautiful' is a flawlessly-produced chunk of modern rock, like Misery Loves Co with female vocals. Trip-hoppy beat-breaks nod in the direction of a modern sensibility, but you're never far from well 'ard metallic guitar chords. I bet the singer headbangs like a good 'un when she's not actually singing. Not my thing, but it could be yours if you're into modern metal.

And now here comes Unhelig with 'Sage Ja'. This is German-language riff-heavy metal, of the Rammstein persuasion. This stuff counts as a genre all by itself these days, and like all genres it's evolving its own rules and conventions. Unhelig follow those rules pretty closely - the deep, sepulchral vocal, the massed chorus, the chug-chug-chug-chug riffs - they touch all the bases, to the point where you can probably hear this track in your head even if you've never heard it in real life. No originality points, then, but if you like the sound of a firmly-struck guitar (or several), this one might be up your strasse.

Last track on the CD, and the musical style abruptly changes as Sweep take us on the 'Last Train To Paris'. This is superior synthpop, in which the song is the thing - curiously, there's a touch of both Soft Cell and the aforementioned Pet Shop Boys in this track. Very Euro-centric (Sweep come from Norway), very classic pop. I suspect an entire album of this stuff might get a bit cloyingly sweet for me, but in a one-song dose I rather like Sweep's winsome pop sensibility.

And that's about the size of it. On the face of it, a varied selection - but always within certain limits. It seems that Dancing Ferret's interests run from fairly straightforward modern metal through to EBM/synthpop stuff, with a side order of trip-hop along the way. Everything here - with the notable exception of Voltaire - is very much of its genre; there are no tracks which took me aback with left-field ideas, or tripped me up with quirky, creative, musical excursions. I don't know if this is just a factor in this particular compilation, or whether it's a general phenomenon with present-day music as a whole, but on this evidence it does seem that very, very few artists have the courage - or simply the *ideas* - to think out of their chosen genre-boxes. Thank God for Voltaire, say I - the only real maverick on a CD of rule-book followers. May he remain evole for ever!

The tunestack:
The Cruxshadows - Winterborn  http://www.cruxshadows.com
Thou Shalt Not - Cardinal Directions http://www.thoushalt.net
The Last Dance - Nightmares  http://www.thelastdance.com
Behind The Scenes - Protection (Shok mix) http://www.behindthescenes.de
Paralysed Age - Berenice  http://www.paralysedage.de
The Dreamside - Faery Child  http://www.dreamside.nl
Ego Likeness - I Live On What's Left http://www.egolikeness.com
Voltaire - When You're Evil  http://www.voltaire.net
Bow Ever Down - Glass Doll  http://www.fade.to/boweverdown
Iris - Unknown (Sub Rosa mix)  http://www.irismusic.com
Tapping The Vein - Beautiful  http://www.tappingthevein.com
Unhelig - Sage Ja  http://www.unhelig.com
Sweep - Last Train To Paris  http://www.sweep.nu

Dancing Ferret Discs:  http://www.ferret.com/discs

Meltdown Magazine: http://www.meltdownmagazine.com

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis: http://www.nemesis.to

Various Artists
Phases: The Dark Side of Music
~reviewed by Joel Steudler

What can you get these days for two dollars? Maybe a hamburger, if you have a coupon. Five or six postage stamps. A gallon of gasoline. Or you could get a compilation CD that assembles te work of fifteen high quality artists to yield over an hour of music. 'What', you say, 'are you smoking, brother?' I am smoke free, but The End Records' new compilation Phases: The Dark Side of Music is red hot and could combust at any moment, so watch out. In the 'bang for your buck' category, you can not go wrong with this unless you already own all of the albums that this material is drawn from.

Phases is divided into three sections, loosely grouping bands by how hard or soft their music is. The album covers miles of the musical landscape, with triprock, black metal, experimental ambient weirdness, artful extreme metal, and more. The lineup they have assembled really is stellar, and shows how committed The End is to signing quality acts. There are no clones here, none of the cookie cutter bands that pad out the rosters of many other labels. All it takes is one listen to this compilation and that much will be clear to just about anyone. It is a great move by the End to showcase just how diverse yet consistently high quality their roster is by releasing a compilation like this.

The one thing I must point out (at the risk of being remiss if I did not) is that about half of the tracks on Phases are available as free mp3 downloads on The End's website. If you have a broadband connection and can download the material quickly, that may play a role in your purchasing decision, but it can be a convenient timesaver otherwise. The tracks by Agalloch, Sculptured, Madder Mortem, Enslaved, Darkthrone, Epoch of Unlight, and Scholomance are all unique to this collection (and their respective artists' albums) and not presented elsewhere for free download. Seven good songs for two dollars (with free shipping in the US, no less!) is more than you get on your standard album these days. You're lucky to get two or three good songs for ten dollars or more on a lot of releases.

My point, then, is that you should buy Phases from The End's web store, particularly if you have yet to experience some of the bands on the compilation. There is something here to please fans of all walks of metal, and all of the acts represented are top notch artists. I would not recommend this to people who hate good music. If you are a hater of good music, or only like to spend your money on worthless items that show dubious artistic taste, this is not the release for you. Everyone else should give it a good hard look, and some good hard cash.

Track List:
THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
1 : The Gathering - Broken Glass
2 : Antimatter - The Art Of A Soft Landing
3 : Ulver - Vowels
4 : Agalloch - A Fragment
5 : Star Of Ash - Death Salutes Atropos

THE DARK SIDE OF THE EARTH
6 : Sculptured - Suspiria
7 : Virgin Black - And The Kiss Of God's Mouth
8 : Nightingale - Shadowman
9 : Madder Mortem - Jigsaw (The Pattern and the Puzzle)
10 : In The Woods - Heart Of The Ages (Live) (in association with Karmakosmetix)

THE DARK SIDE OF THE UNDERWORLD
11 : Enslaved - Queen Of Night
12 : Frantic Bleep - Fluctuadmission
13 : Darkthrone - Divided We Stand (in association with Moonfog)
14 : Epoch Of Unlight - Caught In The Unlight
15 : Scholomance - Goodbye Song

The End Records:
http://www.theendrecords.com/