We were so obsessed with the first Woe record, A Spell For The Death Of Man, a black metal record that was strangely melodic, and peppered its blast and buzz with post rock melodies, and referenced Husker Du and Bastro as much as it did black metal. So not only were we thrilled that this one man band got signed to Candlelight, but that there was a new record on the horizon, which was revealed to be this, the enigmatically titled Quietly, Undramatically, which as you might imagine is neither.
Much like the first record, Quietly begins about as unblack metal as one could imagine, keening guitars, pounding tribal drums, definitely way more math or post than black, but the slow building tension was gradually ratcheted up, some guttural vocal bellows, the whole thing so melodic and epic, and then POW, a classic metal break and the record explodes into some of the fastest most furious black buzz we've heard, constantly shifting into something almost punkish, or slipping in little bits of classic metal, but barreling along ferociously, peppering the blasting buzz with some incredible drumming and some twisted gnarled riffage.
The title track is 8 minutes of pure melodic black bliss, exactly what we loved so much about the first record, sure it's heavy and the drums are blasting, but the melodies soar, and the harmonies are gorgeous, reimagined, this could have been some sort of indie pop song, but here it's something totally other, epic and majestic and so heavy, slipping into midtempo breakdowns that are just as melodic as the main body of the song, relentless but so catchy, 8 minutes is way too short.
The rest of the record is also melodic, but not so obviously so, although "A Treatise On Control" definitely comes close, with its soaring melodies, and super intense crescendos, sounding almost emo at times, super passionate and emotional, a noise rock / screamo / black metal hybrid that totally slays, and while still definitely black metal, manages to elevate the usual tropes and create something distinctly unique.
Lest the true black hordes be discouraged, the final two tracks are way more more furious and frenzied, but even at their most frantic, those songs remain infused with Woe's masterful melodic sense, and a pop element that seems to underpin the otherwise grim proceedings, although perhaps it's not so noticeable that it would distract the casual black metaller. But for us, it only further cements the fact that Woe is making some of the coolest, most distinctive and innovative black metal around, and thus this comes totally and unequivocally recommended to anyone who likes their black metal to not necessarily sound like all the other black metal out there.
A Brand new full length from these East Coast black blasters, and maybe their most black metal. Which is maybe a weird thing to say about a BLACK METAL band, but part of what we dug so much about Woe, especially when they were a he, and a one man bedroom black metal band, is that the black buzz was heavily tempered with lots of post rockisms, and noise rock elements, we mentioned in a past review that their sound was as much beholden to Bastro and Husker Du as black metal. Which was definitely true of their (his) debut, A Spell For The Death Of Man, but slightly less true for record #2 "Quietly, Undramatically", which while still black metal, remained super melodic and definitely still displayed hints of noise rock and other not specifically black elements. Which brings us to Withdrawal, which as we mentioned is maybe the blackest of the bunch. Sure there are moments of clean singing, acoustic guitars, super catchy major key melodies, but really that stuff isn't so rare in black metal, and the band were pretty melodic from the beginning, we even compared certain parts on past records to Alcest and Amesoeurs. But get an earful of the opener, it's frantic and frenzied, exploding immediately into some furious blasting and buzzing, and while the band are still heavy on melody, the buzz and blackness is definitely front and center these days, soaring and epic and majestic, slipping easily from heads down, grim blasting ferocity, to super soaring metal majesty, to galloping thrashing heaviness. There are definitely moments, the band slip into some doomy dirgery, or explode in a bit of mathiness, but it's much more integrated into the group's sound, a sound which is now firmly and solidly black metal, but it's definitely a strain of black metal that few can pull off, and even fewer who are this good. Making grim buzz this catchy, and making melodic blackness sound this fierce and furious, it's pretty incredible, as is pretty much all of Withdrawal, which seems like it wouldn't be nearly as appealing, sans the overt math/noise rockiness, but somehow, those elements remain, just subsumed into the blackness, which is making us dig this just as much, and maybe even a little more that the other Woe records, which is saying a lot!
If you've been paying attention to the Aquarius New Arrivals list (c'mon folks, it's summer now but the school of AQ is still in session, and you're gonna get quizzed on this list later) you'll have come across our recent review of a cd by a heavy, rhythmic British avant-rock outfit with the odd name of Hey Colossus. A great album for those into sludgy, repetitive riffing, maybe like the Melvins meet Circle but more aggro than that.
Hey Colossus already employ no less than three guitars to make their noise but on this vinyl-only EP they've teamed up with another UK band called Woe (a skronky, heavy duty improv jazz beast) to get really really loud and ugly/pretty on two tracks, one of 'em a cover of Miles Davis' "In A Silent Way" believe it or not!! With nine musicians -- including two drummers, two trumpeters, two bassists, keyboards and all those guitars -- this has got some serious avant-heft. "In A Silent Way" has never sounded so ominous and heavy, and the flip is full of militaristic rumble as well. Great stuff! Limited to just 200 copies, on nice thick vinyl, and we have but a handful.
A busy month for local label Time Released Sound, with two new releases for December, this one from Polish composer and violinist Olga Wojciechowska, a collection of tracks originally written for theater and dance productions, but sonically perfectly in line with the TRS 'sound', moody and atmospheric, drifty and cinematic, this one a bit less abstract and electronic, and more modern classical, a heady blend of blurred ambience, and lush orchestration, strings and horns, chimes and drones, the soundtrack to some windswept epic, or some artful romance. A darkly dolorous and hauntingly lovely gem. And as always, there's the standard digipak version, and the SUPER DELUXE version, which this time around is limited to 65 copies, and comes in a hand seen booklet, composed of maps printed on vellum, mazes, a fabric pouch, stamped, punched, hand worked, and all housed in an antique education chart, which in turn is then wrapped in a collaged and stamped envelope. Phew!
A busy month for local label Time Released Sound, with two new releases for December, this one from Polish composer and violinist Olga Wojciechowska, a collection of tracks originally written for theater and dance productions, but sonically perfectly in line with the TRS 'sound', moody and atmospheric, drifty and cinematic, this one a bit less abstract and electronic, and more modern classical, a heady blend of blurred ambience, and lush orchestration, strings and horns, chimes and drones, the soundtrack to some windswept epic, or some artful romance. A darkly dolorous and hauntingly lovely gem. And as always, there's the standard digipak version, and the SUPER DELUXE version, which this time around is limited to 65 copies, and comes in a hand seen booklet, composed of maps printed on vellum, mazes, a fabric pouch, stamped, punched, hand worked, and all housed in an antique education chart, which in turn is then wrapped in a collaged and stamped envelope. Phew!
Originally released as a super limited cassette in 2004, Badb is one of the first releases from Canadian black metal weirdos WOLD, and if you thought the other records were noisy and demented before, this one will blow your mind (and probably your speakers too). After a quick opening intro of whipping winter wind, that ends abruptly as if someone just leaned over and pushed stop on the tape player, the record launches into the title track, the first song in what is apparently a songsuite based on a the myth of a mysterious war goddess, and is an crumbling onslaught of superdistorted buzz and while there may be drums, if there are, they're buried WAY down in the mix, the vocals however are right up front, a wild demonic shriek over the churning roiling blackness below. And so goes the rest of the record, a twisted maelstrom of sound, a sonic blizzard of black buzz and harsh vokills, the guitars less riffy and buzzy as they are practically a Merzbowian wall of blown out white noise, that white noise seeming to be in constant flux, occasionally coalescing into an almost riffy churn, before splintering again into a blast of face melting buzz. The recording is super lo-fi too, which gives even the harshest passages a strange washed out and muted vibe, the coolest parts when the sounds seem to blur into one another and become a strange sort of pulsing alien rhythm.
"Final Offering" might be our favorite, a murky monster of a track, with the most discernible riffing, and a cool murky swirl that envelops everything in its path, and when the vocals back off, the music becomes a weird audial illusion, like those paintings that reveal hidden shapes if you stare at them long enough, the wild tangle of buzz seems to unravel before your ears, the various melodic fragments and interwoven textures shifting and transforming, eventually seemingly melting into a blurry viscous pool of buzz and drone, that eventually fades to black, finishing the record the way it started, with another stretch of frosty winter winds. Awesome. And EXTREMELY noisy, fans of Wold know what to expect, and folks into other noise metal outfits like Nekrosov, Gnaw Their Tongues, Alkerdeel, Hallow and the like will definitely dig, but be warned this is less about THE RIFF and more about blown out blackness...
Latest blast of twisted noise drenched otherworldly blackness from Moosejaw, Saskatchewan's Wold, fronted by mysterious sonic alchemist Fortress Crookedjaw, this mysterious duo offer up another slab of baffling brutality, that seems now more than ever to be almost completely loosed from the bounds of traditional metal, hell, any sort of metal at all, instead sounding like some sort of industrial / noise / power electronics blow out, the sound buzzing and hissing, looped churning squalls of white noise and grey thrum, the vokills an inhuman croak/whine, having just reviewed Sore Throat, and elsewhere on this list Anal Cunt, we'd posit that Wold's sonic orbit exists more in the realm of noise, it's not really until the third track here, "Free Goat Of Leviticus", the the sound takes on a shape even remotely resembling metal, and it remains REMOTE, the blasting and buzzing blown out completely, the sounds blurred and smeared into crumbling crusty murky swells, blistering blasts of buzz and hiss and rumble, even the vocals a garbled transmission from the depths, all wound into a churning caustic chaos.
"Inner Ire" offers a little bit of a respite, dialing back some of the distortion, letting a murky pulse surface, even some barely-there melody here and there, but over the top, is laid a Faxed Head worthy melted tape on the dashboard blast of damaged metallic noise. "Dragon Owl Didacticism" too hints at the metal that must lurk below the surface, but considering the surface is a roiling black cauldron of howl and garble, grind and shriek, all muddied and muted and twisted into dizzying blacknoise streaks, that metal remains just that, a hint.
The last four tracks though, change everything, sounding almost like a different record tacked on as a bonus, the almost cold wave sounding "Dry Love", with it's programmed beat, cold machinelike groove, buzzing clinical angular melodies and strange detached vox, or the new wave blacknoise of "Working Tools For Paris", with a bloopy electro beat buried beneath a swaggery snarly whining vocal and some hazy melodies, and when the super distorted vox drop out, what remains sounds almost like it could be some coldwave rarity unearthed. "Free Eyes" is crusty punk via black metal filth filtered through warped power electronics, with the main 'groove' downright mesmerizing, and then finally, the nearly 11 minute title track, seems to channel aQ beloved Will Over Matter, with another stretch of super distorted blackened murky electro-noize, replete with haunting spoken word vox, and another bloopy beat, one that becomes more and more blown out over the course of the track, until the whole thing is a thick undulating sprawl of rhythmic hypno-noise bliss.
As always, utterly confusing and totally whatthefuck, and as always, we can't stop listening. Baffling brilliant outsider electro-noise black metal genius for sure.
Woah, didn't expect to get another round of these super limited (300 copies to be specific) cassette anthologies from Saskatchewan's favorite (only?) black metal noise terrorists, the mighty WOLD. Imperator serves as a good introduction to the truly insane sounds of WOLD, combining tracks from each of their three awesome full lengths, and more importantly, impossibly rare tracks from various cd-rs and cassettes released in tiny batches that less than 100 people would have ever gotten their hands on.
It's hard to actually describe a band like WOLD. Sure, it's black. You could call it "metal", but these boys whip up some of the noisiest, most out of control sounds ever committed to tape, seeming to owe more of a significant debt to industrial noise merchants like Whitehouse and Throbbing Gristle than any black metal band we could think of. Whatever you want to call it, WOLD's brand of chaos is truly unique. Sheets of uncontrollable white noise, an industrial strength throb, and the unbelievable witch-like shrieks of Fortress Crookedjaw (best black metal name ever, methinks) all merge into a hellacious brew of unrestrained evil, with amazing lyrics (none of which are printed here, so good luck) and perhaps most surprisingly, melodies that are both beautiful and catchy. Of course, said melodies are buried under multiple layers of windy tape hiss, crumbling distortion, and overblown electronics, and what you get out of a WOLD track depends on how well you are prepared to listen, preferably under a pair of headphones at maximum volume. It's like taking a wild ride through a barren wilderness of ice and fog, both disorienting and exhilarating, and noisy as fuck.
Released as a professionally printed, smoky black cartridge on the very cool cassette label Rotting Chapel, this is probably the only chance you will ever have to get this little bastard from us. We got about 10 (yes, TEN) copies, so act fast!
Wold are an ultra mysterious outfit from the barren land to the north (Canada, Saskatchewan to be precise), who play the weirdest and most weirdly recorded black metal we've ever heard. Imagine some old radio serial, or some snippet from an old black and white film, sort of scratchy and fuzzy and otherworldly, then smother it in guitarfuzz and blown out distortion, add some keening guitar melodies and blast beats, and you've got what we can only describe as a black metal Philip Jeck. The warm and warbly keyboard melodies and timeless cinematic snatches of sound are so hypnotic and dreamily repetitive. It's almost like a black metal band doing their own blackened version of William Basinski's Disintegration Loops. Kind of hard to describe, but Wold somehow take the drone-y aspect of BM bands like Graveland and Nargaroth even further, adding a creepy and scratchy looped mesmer beneath a wash of almost My Bloody Valentine like guitars. Or an even more abstract analogy, imagine Persephone in Hades, the goddess of Spring who was kidnapped and spirited down into the depths of hell, all these little ribbons of Springtime and loveliness drifting in the cold and grim underworld, a bleak and miserable expanse of sound with brief glints of color and sunshine, glimpses of a world that once was, looped like a rotting old filmstrip, repeated over and over and over, head nodding, thoughts drifting, eyes closing, spirit shifting, soul blackening.
As if the music weren't weird enough, the band is fronted by the curiously named Fortress Crookedjaw, and backed up by his cohorts, Operationex and Obey.
And then of course there's the band's manifesto:
"Wold embraces the Mytho Poetic; the communication is expressed through our music, and theoretical as well as practical work done through our Woldclan brotherhood and our lodge, the L.O.T.M.P..
"Wold venerate our ancestors and cultures through myth and existence, and remain open and reflective to other effective metaphors.
"Wold promote awareness.
"Wold strive for honor and dignity above materialistic lies and novelty culture.
"Wold solemnly swear to adhere to the law of the Self."
It takes a lot for a record to so completely kick our ass and to so confound us musically. Definitely one of the coolest and weirdest black metal records we've heard in a long long time!!
Seems kind of foolish to continue to proclaim different black metal bands the "weirdest ever" or "the most fucked up we've ever heard". We're quite tempted to take that route again with this bizarre Canadian horde, but the truth is, they were barely black metal to begin with, more a sort of Jeckish, Basinskian ambient blackness that bordered on the downright dreamy. Well, if anything the band has moved even further away from traditional black metal and into a distinctly, more damaged and significantly noisier world of sound.
Fortress Crookedjaw, Obey and Opex, the trio who make up this ensemble, have taken the strange scratched, looped sepia toned smear of their first record, and torn it apart, doused it in white hot sheets of crumbling guitar and damaged feedback, offering up an even more obscured black metal, a metal turned inside out so we can see the squirming guts inside, malfunctioning electronics everywhere, coating every single riff, every growled lyric, every snatch of barely audible drums, in a crackling sparking field of sonic solar flares. Like listening to Jeck's Surf on a busted car radio, where it's mostly static, but you can -almost- hear bits of melody in there somewhere. Or more accurately, listening to some old skipping 78's on Masami Akita's custom sound system, while Malefic from Xasthur sings along.
Some tracks are almost pure noise, the riffs and drums and anything else discernible as actual music, buried beneath an avalanche of Merzbowian skree, usually the vocals hovering atop, like another harsh jagged layer of sound. But occasionally, the noise abates, and we get a glimpse of some melancholy melodic murk inside, or a brief blast of black riffing, but more often than not, those bits are quickly subsumed and the record becomes a roiling chaotic black swirl once more.
A few tracks, like "The Field Hag", harken back to the first record, with the noise reeled in, and a haunting muddy soundscape allowed to drift and shimmer ghostlike, beneath a thick layer of fuzz and grit and a glass gargling demonic screech, and theoretically, every track on Screech Owl is like that, just some are more obscured and obfuscated than others. Tracks like "Windmill" and "A Sword Becomes Red With Fury" are so distorted and blown out, that they become Pan Sonic style glitch and buzz scapes, pulsing short circuited rhythms, spare and skeletal, with almost no trace of melody, metal or otherwise. Like that busted car radio when you go through a tunnel, all distorted and choppy with only little bits and snippets able to surface through the distortion and static.
Screech Owl weaves chaotically from blown out dreamscapes doused in furious fuzz, to crumbling damaged black loopscapes, to Whitehouse style noise, to soft focus looped ambience to ultra lo-fi black metal buzz, often in the same song. Distortion, noise, processed feedback, every track a delicate balance between huge pulsing flows of fuzzed out electronics, buzzing black metal madness and dreamy fuzzy drone and whir. Baffling and fucking brilliant!
One of two black metal / noise hybrids on this week's list, the other, from Australian one man band Nekrasov, this one, the latest from Canadian duo WOLD, whose discs of noise drenched outsider black weirdness have held us in their thrall from the very first listen.
But much has changed since L.O.T.M.P, which was an impossible hybrid of Philip Jeck like turntable warble, and walls of blacknoise, classic black metal buzz filtered through sheets of haze and warped shimmer, well, okay, maybe not that much has changed, if anything, the biggest change is how much noisier Wold have become, and how much more they hew to traditional black metal, albeit appropriately skewed and cracked and fractured and WELL fucked.
For those new to the strange world of Wold, they are a duo (formerly a trio), from Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. They are called Fortress Crookedjaw (best black metal name ever?) and Obey, there's a picture in the new cd of two really regular looking dudes, not sure if it's Wold, but if it is, never has there been more of a "but they were such nice boys" in black metal. Because the sound of Wold is anything but regular black metal. There are riffs, and harsh screeched vocals, there doesn't seem to be drums very often, none are credited in the liner notes, and you can't really hear them, except on one track, where a primitive drum machine spews out a stuttery waltz, and often even when they're NOT there, we still feel like we're hearing them, the duo unfurl sheets of white hot guitar hiss, walls of crumbling distortion, that seem locked in some sort of static sprawl, kind of looped, but also wavery and warbly, due no doubt to the recording quality, as well as the composition. Tape hiss is much of a part of their sound as the guitars, maybe more so. An array of electronics also add layers of grit and glitch, the sounds grind and scrape, piled on top of each other until often it's a seemingly impenetrable wall of sound. But the wall is cracked, and all sort of fucked up sounds ooze through the cracks. Some tracks are super abstract post industrial ambient scrape-scapes, all grinding rhythms, and swirling hiss, others get dangerously close to classic sounding super raw primitive black metal, but as you listen, they seem to change shape, the riffs, the vocals, a glancing listen reveals nothing untoward, just some killer blasting lo-fi buzz, but once you settle in, the music drags you kicking and screaming into some jagged harsh buzz drenched, off kilter chaotic noise infested blackened sonic underworld.
If we had to pick bands to compare Wold to, it might be Ildjarn, Akitsa, Bone Awl, that sort of super raw, blown out in-the-red underproduced fury, but then add some Faxed Head, for the two share a similarly skewed and totally demented aesthetic, but where Faxed Head do it for laughs, Wold twist it into something sinister and frightening. Certainly Merzbow, as NOISE is a major component, but even when Wold are spewing sheets of what appear to be white noise, the sounds are not that simple, they churn and twist, and hide layers upon layers of sonic weirdness underneath. In fact, on first listen we were a bit put off a bit by the sheer noise level of Stratification, gone were all the warped buried 78 sounds, and in their place even more hiss and buzz and skree, but headphones changed everything. Revealing amidst the harshness an incredible array of strange sonic weirdness, buried melodies, obscured loops, bits of prettiness, almost invisible through the haze and murk and blur and NOISE, but which manage to subtly change lead into gold, turning something almost too harsh and abrasive, into something impossibly mesmerizing, and for the adventurous ear-ed, a veritable sonic wonderland of noise drenched beauty.
The return of Canadian black metal weirdos Wold, and another batch of completely blown out, noise drenched, abstract, lo-fi, ultra raw, frosty grim heaviness. Although with these guys, heaviness is not necessarily accurate. It is heavy, but more in the sort of Neil-from-the-Young-Ones kind of 'Heeeeeaavy', totally psychedelic and tripped out, and a blurred, washed out swirl of sounds that only really loosely approximates black metal.
Most metalheads would find themselves diving for the eject button, but for the rest of us, who are willing to dig deep into outsider sounds, Working Together For Our Privacy is as rewarding as any of the other Wold records, a hidden world of sound, melodies, and textures, riffs and beats, almost entirely obscured by swirling whirling clouds of crumbling distortion and FX drenched white noise. On the surface, this is the sound of a million TVs between channels, a symphony of AM radios out of range, broadcasting nothing but static, but like when you stare at snow on a TV screen, images surface and emerge and change and disappear, the same thing seems to happen listening to this Wold record, from the chaotic skree, all sorts of sounds and song fragments surface, revealing something almost pretty lurking beneath the violent and abrasive surface.
All three songs here, long ones, seem cut from the same cloth, each an explosion of industrial crunch, and blurry buzz, heaving and roiling, not even black so much as WHITE, white noise, white out, a cloud of particles and sonic fragments, a barrage of crunch and crush and pummel, that can almost completely block out the songs themselves. Almost. In a weird way, this stuff is hypnotic, mesmerizing, entrancing, if the conditions were right, this sort of thing could definitely lull you to sleep, but cranked through your shitty old speakers, it could also induce embolisms. Such is the magic of Wold. Another winner from these mysterious Canucks, one where the prizes remain a banged head, ringing ears, blown speakers and a head full of buzz....
These eager young Swedish metalheads return with a followup to their excellent self-titled debut. The sticker on the front of the cd case says it all, in two simple words: "Heavy Metal" (with a picture of a spike-clad fist coming at you). It's the NWOBHM all
We praised their debut for being fresh and powerful, retro but not cheesy (unlike so much current European powermetal that's popular). They had a kind of garage edge that got under our skin. This disc is certainly similar -- maybe a bit less catchy than the debut but if anything *more* metal -- starting with the cover. Maybe the unfair criticisms of the wonderful, but somewhat whimsical and unusual album cover art of their previous disc got to the band, 'cause the cover of "Black Wings" sports a much more typically metal design, complete with a new, chrome-plated Wolf logo. That's in keeping with this disc's generally darker, more "evil" tone than Wolf's debut. Song titles like "Demon Bell", "Night Stalker", "Venom", "Genocide", and "Unholy Night" stress that darker, more diabolic direction as well (and demonstrate some imaginative shortcomings, but what do you expect)... Solid Swedish heavy metal for fans of Maiden!!
(By the way, this disc comes with a "special surprise" for PC users -- a hidden song you can download from Wolf's website. Which is nice, but think about it: if the idea is to make a song available only to people who own the cd, why not just PUT IT ON THE CD??! Duh.)
All right! A domestic release for the new, third album from a band that's become a favorite 'round these parts, when the moon is full and we feel like howling along to some killer old school heavy metal made by hungry young Swedish heshers clad in leather and studs. Not exactly the most original band ever, but they've got something -- youthful exuberance, a garagey rock n' roll edge, maybe a sense of both irony and reverence for the masters, not to mention songwriting and playing ability -- that makes this special. Wolf ain't just another European power metal band, they've got an (evil) star quality about 'em for sure.
Their previous two albums worshipped at the altar of Iron Maiden and this one does too but I think their allegiance has tipped somewhat towards Judas Priest. Certainly we'd guess that when Wolf is rehearsing in their practice space they say "let's do our Priest number" when they want to play track two here, "American Storm"! Sounds like something off of Painkiller. Even the lyrics display excessive Halfordisms. But perhaps to demonstate some diversity they end this album with a cover of Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't Fear The Reaper"...which they commendably covert to a Wolf-sounding song, although there's other less well-known BOC tunes I'd rather have heard 'em try. And that's followed by two bonus tracks: covers of Slayer and the Ramones! But it's their own material that makes this disc such a fun slab of retro-metal mania, demonstrating a high level of energy and a knack for melody. The lead-off title track will definitely get stuck in your head, first thing. In fact, while I'm all for extended, six-minute long metal songs, I'd actually suggest that they cut a 'radio edit' of "Evil Star" on the off chance that they could have a pop hit... that'd be cool.
Cd single from this band of Swedish youngsters, metalheads who worship the metalgods of the '80s (Maiden and Priest) rather than trying emulate their Nordic corpse-painted peers. Their debut self-titled album was one of the best "true metal" releases of the
This week's entry into the NWOOSHM (New Wave Of Old School Heavy Metal, we've dubbed it) comes from Sweden's Wolf. This traditional metal band (in the tradition of Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and Mercyful Fate, specifically) are almost not even the new wave anymore, as this is their fifth album! Hard to believe it, we remember like it was yesterday when we first heard their 1999 debut and were like, wow, this band sounds so much like it's 1983, and these dudes probably were toddlers back then! Well now here we are 10 years later and Wolf are still cranking out the true metal like it's, well, no later than 1989.
Ravenous is a good title for this disc, 'cause they sound hungry again, regaining the spark that seemed somehow lacking on their last effort The Black Wind. Singer/guitarist Niklas "Viper" Stalvind's distinctive high pitched vocals scream out lyrics inspired (but not THAT inspired, if you know what we mean) by horror and history, backed by chunky riffs, shredding leads, and galloping rhythms. Nothing incredibly original, but quite metallically solid, indeed, exceedingly ass kicking. Which is pretty much all you can ask from a band called Wolf who write songs with titles like "Whiskey Psycho Hellions", eh?
"Love At First Bite" is another song here, and we're pretty sure it's not about the '70s Dracula comedy starring George Hamilton, but it would be cool if it was. Oh, and in case you were wondering, the current lineup of Wolf all have nicknames, the others besides "Viper" are: "Raptor", "Axeman" (no prizes if you guess what instrument he plays), and "Tornado". We can see -maybe- calling somebody Viper on a regular basis, but do you really think their buddies say, "Yo, Tornado, let's grab a beer?" Or, "Dude, did you see that chick Axeman was hanging out with?" No, we don't think so...
Don't think we're making FUN of Wolf though, we think it's all part of their plan. Likewise with the fact that the Wolf logo on the Ravenous cd itself is, for some reason, pink!
Fourth album from these Swedish traditional metal mongers. Speedy and catchy and all done up in the denim and leather. Yep they deliver the goods, but we're not sure how inspired this sounds this time around... I mean, we loved their debut and each subsequent release, but although their head-bangin' batteries haven't run low, the special creative x-factor perhaps has...we're not hearing anything new here. Or maybe we just weren't in the mood. Can't point out exactly what's wrong, maybe nothing, or it's just the lyrics that are sounding tired to us. Certainly they still seem just as rippin' and retro as before, music-wise. If you liked their other discs, definitely at least give a listen to the sound clips below... but if you don't have their other discs, we're not sure if we'd say to start with this one. Get the self-titled debut, or their previous one Evil Star instead.
Ah, and we'll give it another listen. After all, we *know* that these guys are capable of making metal's many cliches sound fresh, and if that was tougher for them than usual this time, it should still be a fun spin when we're in a less critical mood...
Young Swedes playing traditional heavy metal, a pretty great debut. No Hammerfall-like pop silliness, just heads-down, raised-fist, speedy Iron Maiden/Riot styled METAL with decent-enough (not too) high pitched vocals, and plenty of ripping guitar work. And the production, courtesy of Peter Tagtgren (Scandinavian metal producer of the moment), is super. Take the likes of In Flames or Soilwork, add real vocals and make the songs a bit more catchy, that's Wolf. And they should get props for the incredible Richard Scarey/children's book-like cover art (by famed European illustrator Hans Arnold), a cover which has been universally but unjustly slammed in all (otherwise positive) reviews that we've seen of this album. It's great, and it harkens back to the album covers of the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal which weren't afraid to be weird and not-blatantly metal for metal's sake. Anyway, we applaud the band for their unafraid aesthetic choice. More importantly, we also salute them for making such a great record!!
Every city has / needs / should have a band that sounds just like Guided By Voices. Portland has Wolf Colonel. While their previous album offered up the sounds of bombastic power pop and loud guitar rawk whipped up together, this time around they're indeed mining the GBV pop nooks and crannies. Definitely a sparser and slower Wolf Colonel.
New from K Records. Music for summertime cruising with your highschool honey. A youthfully bombastic meltdown of power pop and hard rockin' guitar. A bit if Buffalo Tom, a bit of Big Star. 15 tunes in all make up one catchy good time. Rumour has it that live they are equal parts metal and standup comedy!?
For their latest collection of homebrewed electronic analogue filth, the boys in Wolf Eyes have decided to join the Hospital Productions roster, home of Prurient, Cold Cave, Ash Pool, Grey Wolves, Prurient, Kevin Drumm, Malkuth, and in some ways it's a perfect match. While all of that typically crusty and blown out Wolf Eyesian buzz and glitch and ruble and whir is all intact, Always Wrong actually displays a fairly significant shift, not just in sound, but in song writing. Unlike past efforts which tended toward the epic side long abstract noise jams, AW is practically a collection of songs, with vocals playing a much more significant part, sure they still offer up serious shards of skree and dense chunks of jagged buzz, but the manage as always to make their noise MORE than just noise, texture, timbre, mood, melody, and for the first time, SONGS.
The record opens with some electronic buzz and some muffled percussion, and right up front some snarled vox, spitting all kinds of venomous vitriol, over a strangely haunting glitchscape, before finally erupting into a clattery clangy Wolf Eyed Whitehouse jam. Tons of feedback, swooping electronic tones, clipped and stuttery chunks of buzz and squeal, all somehow woven into a lurching, stumbling malfunctioning industrial lumber. But it's the next track where things get really interesting, beginning with another high end squall, the streaks of skree get smoothed into haunting melodies, backing up a drawled gloomy almost Lou Reed sounding vocal, underneath it all a darkly gothic bassline, all murky and buzzy, some crunchy riffage popping up here and there, the whole thing a darkly swirling, but still crunchy and caustic, bit of coldwave, that should definitely please fans of the dark and morose, the brooding and black.
"Broke Order" sounds almost punk rock, crushing crumbling detuned crush, over grinding mechanical rhythms, dense clouds of blurred buzz, and yowled vokills, a lumbering lurching ultra heavy distortion drenched monstrosity, that again, manages to still be weirdly, if just barely, melodic.
The rest of the record drifts druggily between those different sounds, "Pretending Alive" is a slow crawl, of reverbed metallic percussion, jazzy horns, lots of layered amp buzz and tape hiss, spidery disembodied guitars, "We All Hate You", is another strangely post punk post industrial almost new wave sounding jam, more moody vox, heavily effected electronic beats, thick gritty textures, and woozy minor key melodies, finishing off with "Droll / Cut The Dog", starting our downright pretty, long form drones, deep resonant rumbles, tense minor key melodies, very creepy and cinematic, the buzz and glitch kept to a minimum, eventually shifting gears into another sort of industrial coldwave outro, all pounding minimal rhythm, sung spoken vocals, warm washes of washed out hiss, dense tangles of undulating drones, and as always, lots and lots of glorious blown out buzz.
Okay, we only got a handful of these in, and in very limited sizes, but we figured we oughta grab as many as we can since so many AQ fans are such huge Wolf Eyes and Grey Daturas freaks. That means act fast, and don't be too bummed if we've already sold out. We took every single one the bands had left.
So this pack includes a killer black on white exclusive Australian tour design Wolf Eyes t-shirt, a Wolf Eyes pin, and a gorgeous full color poster. Super limited, and of the sets with large t-shirts we only got 8!!!
The shirt/poster/button combo has to ship in a tube, so if you order this with other items it will have to ship separately and thus there will be an extra shipping charge.
only 4 in stock!!
Okay, we only got a handful of these in, and in very limited sizes, but we figured we oughta grab as many as we can since so many AQ fans are such huge Wolf Eyes and Grey Daturas freaks. That means act fast, and don't be too bummed if we've already sold out. We took every single one the bands had left.
So this pack includes a killer black on white exclusive Australian tour design Wolf Eyes t-shirt, a Wolf Eyes pin, and a gorgeous full color poster. Super limited, and of the sets with medium t-shirts we only got 8!!!
The shirt/poster/button combo has to ship in a tube, so if you order this with other items it will have to ship separately and thus there will be an extra shipping charge.
only 4 in stock!!
Okay, we only got a handful of these in, and in very limited sizes, but we figured we oughta grab as many as we can since so many AQ fans are such huge Wolf Eyes and Grey Daturas freaks. That means act fast, and don't be too bummed if we've already sold out. We took every single one the bands had left.
So this pack includes a killer black on white exclusive Australian tour design Wolf Eyes t-shirt, a Wolf Eyes pin, and a gorgeous full color poster. Super limited, and of the sets with small t-shirts we only got 4!!!
The shirt/poster/button combo has to ship in a tube, so if you order this with other items it will have to ship separately and thus there will be an extra shipping charge.
only 4 in stock!!
Not sure exactly what this is, tough to keep track of all the cd-r's and limited lps and everything, but it does appear to be a brand new full length, although it's vinyl only for now. Apparently one single track, spread out over two sides, Black Wing Over The Sand continues to display Wolf Eyes' developing musicality, while managing to not lose a single bit of brutality, which is quite a feat. This is another dark slab of beautiful malevolence, equal parts corrosive rumble and shimmery drone, creepy dark ambience and intense industrial clatter. Side one, the first movement, begins with grinding guitars, blown out streaks of spacy effects, huge synth swells and jagged bits of percussion, occasionally overwhelmed by massive waves of low end buzz that somehow manage to swallow everything else up. Near the end of side one, the record winds down into what could only be described as some sort of Wolf Eyes dub, lots and lots of space, a lurching non-rhythm spread waaaaay out, crashing crumbling bursts scattered throughout. Really cool. Wouldn't mind hearing a whole record of that...
The second side returns to more familiar Wolf Eyes territory, upping the buzz and the industrial clatter. still creeping along, everything wrapped in a black cloak of fuzz and rumble, but much more aggressive, intense, thicker, with layer after layer of constantly shifting sound. Intense, but still managing to be surprisingly musical and listenable.
LIMITED TO 900 COPIES. Vinyl only, packaged in a cool black and white sleeve with some strange animal torture woodcut on one side and a mysterious mountain on the other. Full color printed inner sleeve too. Really nice...
Wolf Eyes really tend to divide folks right down the middle. Love 'em or can't stand 'em. And in typical Wolf Eyes fashion, they're going to do their very best to annoy the fuck out of everybody with their 'big break' Sub Pop debut. Quite possibly the harshest Wolf Eyes record, which is saying a lot, Burned Mind is a caustic mouthful of acid, spit right in your eyes (ears?). A head melting electronic throb, equal parts damaged malfunctioning synths, squealing feedback, ultra distorted howls, skittering skipping sort-of-rhythms. Wolf Eyes, more than almost any other band, definitely sound damaged and fucked and seriously messed up. But what keeps Burned Mind from being a boring old straight up noise record? Hard to say. But something definitely does. Some mysterious intangible something. Burned Mind is definitely harsh, bit in no way unlistenable. In fact it's strangely beautiful and subtly (VERY subtly) melodic. Equal parts Factrix, Merzbow, Throbbing Gristle, Whitehouse but all warped and twisted into the uniquely fucked sonic world of Wolf Eyes.
Michigan's masters of the gristled throb return with their second record this year. Maybe the only group still carrying the torch of eighties industrial (TG, Psychic TV, etc.) Wolf Eyes continue to spew forth a noxious brew of analogue electronics, squealing feedback, primitive drum machines and tortured, anguished howls. At first this seemed like their weakest record, but on repeated listens, this 3 track sort-of-e.p. reveals itself as maybe their best. Perhaps not as brutal and abrasive, but just as intense and much more -gasp- melodic. The first track burns slow and dark, like an Italian horror movie soundtrack done music concrete style. Chirping and whirring, like the sound of mechanical insects creep over a soundscape that is downright ambient. Eventually the inevitable onslaught begins, as Merzbowian white noise swells and Mothra-like sqwawks collide with machinery run amok, a wall of squeals and creaks and rumbles. The second and third track, are a little more 'classic' Wolf Eyes, you know, sort of like the bastard offspring of Whitehouse and Suicide. A simple pulse, throbs relentlessly as unintelligible, gutteral vocalisations battle for supremecy with high pitched squeals and feedingback amps. Track three is a bit more sedate, but just as ominous and rhythmically pulsing. Some sweet, sweet noise.
Super limited lp reissue of an even more limited (and seriously out of print) cd-r from Michigan's noise rock super heroes. Recorded right before core-member Aaron Dilloway left the fold, this is the 'Eyes at their most caustic, but also at their most ambient and spare. The sounds are harsh, and hissing and crumbling into jagged shards of white noise, but they are spread out over wide open fields of minimal hiss and rumbling drones.
Long stretches of grinding industrial grit, glitchy malfunctioning electronics, bits of random percussive clatter, growled and grunted vocalizations, processed horns, bleats and skronks buried amidst thick swirls of rroooaaarrr, that the band pulls apart into weird desiccated carcasses laying under a burning hot sun, rotting and slowly liquefying into black pools of thick fuzz and clouds of insectoid whir.
One side spins at 33, the other at 45, packaged in cool silk screened sleeves. LIMITED TO 600 COPIES!
Ann Arbor, Michigan. Home to heavy, powerful dirge rock and noise from the likes of Gravitar and Universal Indians and the power electronics sabotage of Nautical Almanac. Somewhere in between lies the homemade electronics power sludge of Wolf Eyes. Aaron Dilloway (Mr. Hanson Records) heads this behemoth, always unpredictable -- from beat driven floor shakers to tweaked out
Wolf Eyes, who in the past have recorded EVERY show and EVERY practice, most of which were then released as limited cd-r's, seem to be trying to replicate that working method on a larger scale, with releases raining down on us at an almost Acid Mothers Temple rate. But who's complaining?
Fuck Pete Larsen is a cd reissue of a super limited lp from a few months back, and just to keep collectors moaning, and completists whining, it's NOT the same as the lp. Pete Larsen is the guy who runs Bulb records, an early champion of Wolf Eyes, and we're not sure if the title here is a serious jab or a playful nudge, either way, it can't be too serious, as Wolf Eyes' usual cacophony gets toned down quite a bit here. We're not talking Windham Hill or anything. But it's definitely dronier and less caustic and at moments downright listenable! Less jagged and piercing, F.P.L. is more slowly bulldozing, like a massive sonic avalanche, lower register Merzbow covered by Throbbing Gristle and processed into a slowly shifting white hot glacier of malfuntioning electronics, sheets of feedback, strange percussive detritus, and all manner of throb and rumble. Definitely still noise, and most certainly noisy, but muted and subtle enough to maybe win over some dronesters (fans of Coleclough, Maeor Tri?) or even some doomsters (fans of Sunn, Earth, Khanate?).
A limited lp reissue of a long out of print cd-r released on Wolf Eyes' own American Tapes label, Fuck The Old Miami contains an entire live show on one side, a haunting and creepy and of course NOISY balst of throbs and rumbles, crackle and splatter, surprisingly restrained for these noiseniks, and a bit more 'listenable' than their recent Sub Pop record, and on the other side, a needle shredding series of hand cut grooves, cut on the bands own record lathe (and playable "at your own risk") cut right over a hand carved etching. Cool. Playable but very noisy and chaotic from all the random grooves. Not sure which side we like better!
Over the years, Wolf Eyes have morphed into a whole different beast. Without losing the very essence of what made them so vital and exciting. After countless releases (including hundred of tapes and cd-r's), their caustic corrosive confrontational side has been tempered by a knack for creating dark soundscapes, for crafting sinister cinematic tableaus, and for making serious, almost musical music.
We never thought it would happen. And it happened so gradually that we almost didn't notice. But a quick listen to opener "A Million Years" tells the whole story. A brooding doomy plod. Grinding industrial drones drift over a simple machine like thud, in the distance free jazz horns bleat and squeal, suspended in thick clouds of grimey glitch and hissing buzz. This could definitely be the soundtrack to some post apocalyptic horror movie. Huge howls spill out of cracked electronics, like pools of black blood. It's amazing, that Wolf Eyes could get MORE melodic and MORE musical, and somehow be even more fucking frightening.
And the rest of the record wanders bruised and bloody through similarly harsh and harrowing sonic landscapes. Veering from sounding like some sort of plodding doom metal behemoth to dreamy atmosphericists. A keening buzz becomes a raga like drone and then devolves into a thick caustic dirge, with growled blackened vocals, pummeling throb percussion and what sounds like a swarm of detuned guitars, all lurching evilly beneath a dense cloud of shimmery skree. Gurgling low end, sine waves and grinding electronic grit spread out over a wide expanse of creepy crawly ambience, a drifting droning underworld rife with weird horn like squalls and all manner of little sonic irregularities. Muttered vocalizations, are unfurled Whitehouse style over a corrosive bed of broken synth buzz and muted percussive thump. Huge swaths of grinding, howled metallic grate and howl drift and hover over ominous swirls of foghorn rumble and the growls and moans of some primeval wounded beast.
This is some scary scary shit indeed. But at the same time, it's hauntingly beautiful, a glimpse into some hellish underworld, each listen revealing more details, more black shadows, more mysterious melodies lurking around and beneath each prickly squall of creeping bleat, all sorts of minor scale sonic events and subtle dreamlike drones buried within every pulsing wave of subterranean throb and buzzing ambient grind.
If Hollywood had any sense, or any balls, Wolf Eyes would be scoring every fright flick from here on out. But the truth is, we've never actually seen a movie scary enough to warrant music this goddamn scary!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Super limited 10" from these legendary Michigan noisemongers. Side one is surprisingly tranquil, a grugling, expansive head trip, all space and reverb, not unlike some sixties electronic music experiment, heavily effected sound fragments reverberate across a dark and cold sonic void, creepy and beautiful. Side two starts off with a track of sort-of-beats scrapped together from malfunctioning electronics and bathed in all sort of splattery buzz, while the second track is clattery, clangy noise-y mayhem, with random percussion, squalls of electronic spzzt and backwards cymbals. Numbered and again, VERY LIMITED.
Might as well start out by saying this is most definitely the prettiest Wolf Eyes record we've ever heard. And certainly the most listenable, but of course, both of those descriptors are pretty subjective, especially when applied to a group like Wolf Eyes, who are as capable of conjuring up sheets of face melting noise as they are blissed out industrial shimmer. But for No Answer-Lower Floors, it sounds like they've tried something entirely different. The vibe is droney, and darkly psychedelic, the noise elements are muted, or sculpted into melodies, the opener sounds like Wolf Eyes via Can, a sort of kraut-noise, a simpler rhythm, wreathed in strange bits of buzz and thrum, the occasional streak of high end skree, the vocals laid back and laconic, almost spoken, a sort of woozy croon, the vibe is a mellower Dead C, or a super abstract lo-fi This Heat, weirdly hypnotic and trancey, minimal and murky, it's almost a sort of chill out version of Wolf Eyes, and we dig it a lot.
There are some brief song fragments, interludes maybe, that find the group digging into their slightly noisier bag of tricks, one is a sort of pounding muted pop song, laced with wild malfunctioning FX and electronic squiggles, but retains the vibe of the opener. One is a weird collaged of fragmented voices and weird swirling clouds of high end bleeps, all chopped and layered, but then there's "Chattering Lead" which is even more mellow and trance-y than the opener, whirling organ shimmer, over a muted pulse, a skittery electro rhythm, all manner of chitter and bleep swirling in the background, more of those druggy disembodied vox, it's a gorgeously soporific sprawl of minimal creep-pop dirge, reminding us of our favorite Gate tracks, that same sort of sad boy indie rock slowed way down and blurred into a hazy drift. "Confession Of The Informer" is another minimal drifter, this one a bit more creepy and cinematic, lots of space, and ominous rumbles, strange minor key melodies, and soundtracky ambience, there's a pulse, a spaced out rhythm, over which a strange swirl of voices and sounds drift and shift, dark and minimal and moody, hushed and haunting.
Finally, the record finishes with another stretch of rhythmic post industrial dirgery, this one flecked with bursts of what sounds like buzzsaw electronics, beneath which, another minimal rhythm unfurls, a dark somnambulant lope, looped and cyclical, a sort of power electronics hypno-drift, and while that relentless blast of electronics is mildly harsh, somehow, it ends up being more soothing and mesmerizing, the whole thing like some caveman This Heat. Definitely our new favorite Wolf Eyes record, and very likely the sort of record that could convince unsuspecting innocents to finally decide they like 'noise music'...
The Michigan noisejunk / scumart / ghettopunk antirockers Wolf Eyes have amassed an impressive arsenal of gear salvaged from planned obsolescence or from becoming landfill fodder; thus, their preferred medium (the cassette) is quite fitting. Fortunately, they have enough sense to realize that their music runs the risk of never being heard if they stuck to the cassette format, and have re-issued a couple of their albums as CDs and / or LPs. "Slicer" follows "Dread" as the second Wolf Eyes cassette to be reincarnated as a CD, and is just as punishing, gritty, and lo-tech as its predecessor. While vaguely associated with the aggro-rock of contemporaries like Lightning Bolt, Total Shutdown, Black Dice and the latest John Dwyer project, Wolf Eyes have much more in common with the electrocution tactics of the Industrial pioneers Throbbing Gristle, SPK, and Lille Roger (the precursor to the Swedish death industrial project Brighter Death Now). No one will ever accuse Wolf Eyes of being funky, as their drum machine programming usually amounts to a deliberate pulse from an 8-bit thud acquiring the monotonous dis-ease of unknown panzer division systematically destroying the Eastern European countryside. Squiggles of equally primitive and equally agitated 8-bit noise from cheap synthesizers and abused samplers spiral throughout these skeletal rhythms. This isn't music that wants to be pleasant, harmonious, or enjoyable. Rather "Slicer" is a grim vision of what would happen if art-students scripted the apocalypse. Scary indeed!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Limited, three track mini lp from recent Sub Pop signees and masters of midwestern electronic sludge Wolf Eyes. Not to be confused with their recent "Stabbed In The Face" split with fellow noiseniks Panicsville, these three tracks display the many sides of the boys in Wolf Eyes, all of them nasty and gritty. Side A is an extended slithering electronic knife in the back, with grinding electronic fuzz and pulsing murky beats, and growling vocals. Like a no-fi, no budget Nine Inch Nails. Creepy and dark and really fucking scary. The first track on side B is a beautifully eerie ambient soundscape of electronic misfires and found sound snippets. Amps buzz and crickets chirp. Nice. Track two is a throbbing blast of hypno crush, that culminates in a mesmerising locked groove that was so cool, we let it play for about 15 minutes even after we realised it wasn't going to stop.
Two song teaser for an upcoming full length and it's a doozy. And it's two sides of Wolf Eyes we don't get to see all that much of, and hearing it here, we're sort of jonesing for more of both. On the one side (both literally and figuratively) we have Wolf Eyes as some sort of plodding doom metal behemoth. A keening buzz becomes a raga like drone and then devolves into a thick caustic dirge, with growled blackened vocals, pummeling throb percussion and what sounds like a swarm of detuned guitars, all lurching evily beneath a dense cloud of shimmery skree.
On the flipside (again, both figuratively and literally) we've got the softer more sensitive Wolf Eyes, well, okay maybe not so much softer and more sensitive as less harsh and noisy, more creepy and dark. Gurgling low end, sine waves and grinding electronic grit spread out over a wide expanse of creepy crawly ambience, a drifting droning underworld rife with weird horn like squalls and all manner of little sonic irregularities. Pretty dang cool. We're definitely psyched to hear what they do for the next full length.
This isn't so new, but we finally have some in stock. The first full length from Ann Arbor's doom electronic duo of Aaron Dilloway and Nathan Young, aka Wolf Eyes. Imagine a lo-fi Suicide focused on tweaked out homemade electronic destruction. Or a less punk
It was only a matter of time really. The bad boys of noise rock, and the grandaddy bad boy of modern avant jazz... Okay, maybe it wasn't only a matter of time, who would have ever really dreamed up a Wolf Eyes / Anthony Braxton jam session? Braxton maybe. He has a penchant for odd pairings. Remember his saxophone / stand up comedian disc? Well Black Vomit might not be -quite- as whatthefuck as that one, but it is pretty strange. And surprisingly, it's also pretty dang listenable. Especially for a disc called Black Vomit, with tracks called "The Mangler" and "Rationed Rot". "The Mangler" starts off all dreamy abstract soundscape, with the Wolf Eyes boys creating haunting landscapes of scrape and skitter, deconstructed streaks of electronic buzz and thick smears of low end grind, while Braxton sort of soars above it all, his horn emitting thick swirls of resonant rumble, dissonant bleating, and mournful minor key groans. It almost sounds like that guy on the corner playing sax and busking for change being sucked into hell, the ground just opening up as he plunges into a cacophonous wasteland. The last 5 or 6 minutes do finally take the plunge into all out noise, but even then, it's weirdly textural and while not -easy- on the ears, still strangely accessible, even with the swirls of malfunctioning electronic crunch and weird demonic vocals.
Track two is introduced by the Wolf Eyes guys asking Braxton which he'd rather hear, "Leper War" or "Black Vomit"? His response, a hearty "BLACK VOMIT!" gets the crowd cheering and Wolf Eyes immediately launch into a musical world of hurt. The sound blisses out after a few minutes into a weirdly percussive soundscape, of low end throb and high end skitter, but before too long Braxton has joined the melee and they ratchet up the noise quotient and it's a swirling, grinding, churning free noise, wild jazz lead pipe to the side of the head. Wow. How fucking cool is Anthony Braxton? Recorded live in 2005 (the between song banter is pretty funny, especially the "Good night..." bit at the end), rumor had it that Victo didn't even want to release this, but damn if it's not one of the coolest records they've ever put out!
I can see the kids ' mouths watering. If this were a show, Wolf Eyes and Black Dice, the tight pants, too-small thrift store t-shirts, white belts and bowl haircuts would be lined up around the block. And for good reason. Black Dice and Wolf Eyes are two of only a tiny handful of bands making some seriously challenging, damaged, and beautiful noise. This collaboration is maybe a bit more tranquil that you'd expect, but its listenability shouldn't deter you. The sound is a lot like Black Dice's recent Beaches And Canyons album, all rhythmic hypnos and soundscape shimmer, but with Wolf Eyes supplying a gritty electronic, rubble strewn back drop for the proceedings. Side one is droning skree over tinkling bells, swelling until it becomes a blast of full on malfunctioning Merzbow machine mayhem. Side two gets downright dreamy, a groovy sidelong Krautrock epic, so smooth and serene you'd never guess it was either of these bands. A seriously great record.
Another Wolf Eyes collab finally available on cd!
Portland's clattery, free improvised noise unit meets Ann Arbor's caustic power electronic doom-synth trio, for an unprecedented meeting of the..uh..minds. Smega seem to come out on top, with the overall sound falling squarely in their clinking, crashing, hippie music concrete by way of No Neck Blues band free folk clatter and Negativland-ish plunderphonic found sound collage. The strong sonic personalities in Wolf Eyes seem to have no problem playing the supporting role here, underscoring the ramshackle freeness of Smegma, with their buzzing homemades synths, and grinding electric guitar grit.
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Killer picture disc reissue of a long out of print double cassette, on which each member of Wolf Eyes does a whole side solo, and then the band does a whole side together. Hard to tell whose side is whose, which sort of makes sense really, all four sides sound distinctly Wolf Eyes-ish, and all are pretty dang great, it hardly matters.
Four massive expanses of growling gloomy synthscapes, murky doom, damaged deconstructed space rock, wild cacophonies of high end skree and upper register scrape and squeal, long stretches of near orchestral noise, tranquil and ghostly ambience, moaning crumbling tape damage, humming streaks of monotone buzz and crackle, barely there swirls of surface noise and low end rumble, bits of metallic clang, creaking moaning strings, muted percussive rhythms buried in thick swaths of black ambience, a litany of mysterious ambience and post industrial experimentation. Noisy and murky and creepy and exactly what you might expect from a Wolf Eyes free for all.
Plain black gatefold sleeves, gorgeous picture discs pressed on super thick vinyl. LIMITED TO 1000 COPIES!! We got a handful and WILL NOT be able to get more....
They may be thousands of miles apart, but it would take more than something like distance to keep these two forces of musical darkness from meeting and unleashing this Black Plague. AQ faves, Australian noise rockers the Grey Daturas, were visited recently by the US ambassadors of noise, Wolf Eyes. Never one to squander an opportunity to get together and kick up a ruckus, the Daturas dragged the Eyes into the studio, and both bands spent a few hours cooking up their own unique vision of sonic decay. Wolf Eyes came up with the 5 part "Post Civilization Muzak", 24 minutes of grrrrrrrrrrrinding post industrial brutality. Huge sheets of coruscating electronics, super distorted guitar, and wild streaks of white hot feedback, all tangled up into a blazing blood red supernova of sound.
The Grey Daturas counter with some musical density of their own. A bit more lo-fi, three long tracks, one a tangled freejazz grind psychnoise splatter, a blurred cloud of stuttery staggering freakout, another a slow plodding glacial sludge, with thick washes of abstract doom and simple tribal drumming and finally a full on far out post rock post punk instrumental epic, heavy and droney and massive. Pretty killer stuff.
Packaged in a glossy digipak and released on the Daturas' Heathen Skulls label. Includes a bonus Wolf Eyes track NOT included on the upcoming domestic lp version!!
This is a split release if there ever was one. Two bands and SIX labels!! Indie labels Up Jumps The Devil, Vegalia, SNSE, Muet, Ignivomous and Nihilist all pitched in to bring us this tag team match of NOISE NOISE NOISE!!! First up, psuedo-industrial noiseniks, Factrix worshippers and AQ faves Wolf Eyes offer up a churning throbbing rhythm built from moaning low end organs, a sort of chopped-up hiccupping drone, that quickly splinters into FULL ON NOISE, pink noise and white noise battle feedback and rhythmic pulses of industrial crunch and midwestern style Japanoise. Panicsville, who we aren't so familiar with, present a very Wolf Eyes like din, that starts off innocently enough with bleeps and bloops and clicks and whirs, but soon erupts into a crushing tidal wave of rumbling, warbling drones, malfunctioning-video-game crunch, screeching feedback and distorted howls and screeches. Recorded live too, as far as we can tell. A seriously solid split of blistering brutality. Those of you who need this know who you are! Cool, gory cover art and swirly grey vinyl! ----* ----* Compilations : ----*
Super limited collaboration between well known industrial noise drone pioneers Wolf Eyes and lesser known noisenik Sickness. And thankfully, like a lot of the noise music we've been digging lately, this is much less noisy, and much more textural, a grim blackened ambience, albeit peppered with a fair bit of noisiness.
The A side begins with a shimmery mechanical loopscape, wreathed in high end tones and keening feedback, which gives way to a heaving sea of hiss and shriek before slipping into deep speaker rattling buzz, a massive abstract low end rhythms seemingly fashioned from moaning foghorns and the clang of shipping containers. There's more static and whir and muffled murky industrial clatter before a buried, but caustic harsh noise outro.
The second side is a muted minimal dronescape, all buried melodies and looped fragments, bits of distortion and rhythmic skitter, soon joined by a throbbing electronic pulse beneath a roiling swirl of ominous crunch and metallic buzz. The track transforms into a field of jagged white noise, chopped up and stuttery, skittering and hiccupping, creating all manner of inadvertent noise almost-grooves, before being swallowed up by a swell of deep rumble and a coda of crumbling strangled guitar freakout.
SUPER LIMITED. We got about half the copies we ordered so odds are these will be gone quick� ----* ----* Selected New Arrivals : ----*
Wolf Parade's Apologies To The Queen Mary are far from prim and proper. Yes, they are Canadian, so they're prolly quite polite, but this band's debut album is not about sitting with your hands folded in your lap, timidly tapping your toe. Just get a load of those ultra punchy hooks and super emotive vocals! They're meant for movin'. Wolf Parade is like a super pop incarnation of fellow Canucks Arcade Fire with a youthful David Bowie singing the lead vocals. Definitely the flavour of the day. Sound yummy to you?
Wolf Parade fans will probably have already devoured this one, and don't need us tellin' them what's what! But whoa, it caught us by surprise! Those Wolf Parade folks seem to have taken a downer prior to recording their latest album! With the exception a few fleeting glistening warm pop moments, their exuberance is nothing short of deflated on At Mount Zoomer. Bummer 'cause when they're barrelling along at full throttle pop buoyancy, it's pretty darn irresistible. Sadly it never happens on this album. What's left are songs that sound more akin to the dour melodrama of New York's Interpol than the spritely orchestral drama-pop of their Canadian brethren Arcade Fire. Yes, still very dramatic and well executed, but the shift in mood may take some getting used to. Now, we all know that musical originality is a rare thing these days, and most current bands including Wolf Parade don't have a wealth of it. At Mount Zoomer finds them inevitably ending up once again as being most remarkable as a RIYL ("recommended if you like") band. So, that said, a solid album that sits right at the crossroads between Arcade Fire and Interpol!
