noise & power electronics

Almost inaudible, subterranean, unholy black noise. The grinding low rumble is not dissimilar to that offered by bands in the gorenoise / noisecore scenes, or even reminiscent of harsh noise itself. Very repetitive, dark and disgusting, making the 5 minutes run time feel a lot longer than it actually is. I can’t imagine getting this from a distro in 1993, throwing it on the turntable and hearing it for the first time with no context….

Often heralded as one of the best / most terrifying pieces of industrial / noise music that can be found, Leichenschrei is a dark and twist trip through a seemingly endless patchwork quilt of disturbing samples, clanking noise and dense atmospheric intensity. Personally, I don’t find this all that terrifying or disturbing, but it’s incredibly well made and an absolute pleasure to listen to. The freeform tracks unfold expertly, drawing you in to their thick,…

Very surprised to see the year of release on this thing, it feels older than time and from an early (and better) era of power electronics / death industrail. Expect cold, wailing atmospheric drones and noises, part introspective and part absolutely terrifying; an analogue, rough and ready journey through an electronic hell. Great stuff.

I first bought the Mahakali album in 2010 or 2011 and despite being massively into Swans and even some of the guest players here (Atilla for example), the album didn’t really resonate with me. I found it slow, frustrating and directionless. I’m not sure what has changed, but coming back to it thirteen years later and I am immediately blown away by this thing. I listened to the whole thing through for the first time…

Pretty incredible that this came out in 1995, when you think about it. Not that it was particularly far ahead of its time or anything like that, I’m just a simpleton and I’m easily amazed by the crushing certainty of the passing of time. Anyway, Ai is a busy slice of noise, with all sorts of punishing sounds going on (and some great cover photography to boot). If you like your noise more involved rather…

Urine Festival bring that bubbling vats of boiling piss vibe to the party that girls really like. If you wanna holler at a shawty and you want to show her that you’re freaky, play her this 7”. Guaranteed success! CID bring that same piss vats vibe to extra-tone / splittercore drum speeds mixed with oddly coherent riffs. Legit though, when I first heard this 7” back in I wanna say 2010 (I bought it from…

When I was younger I’ll admit that I perhaps did not “get” Consumer Electronics. Truthfully, I don’t really know if I “get” Consumer Electronics now but I find the “music” infinitely fascinating if nothing else. Are there just rambling diatribes of fever and madness? Or is it more than that? Can sense be made from all of this? I’m not entirely sure. Unsettling.

In all seriousness, Hybrid Nosebloom is one of the more listenable slices of electronic tomfoolery from everyone’s favourite bird-loving noise maniac, Merzbow. To say that this is not as “harsh” as other releases of his is perhaps incorrect, as if you turn this thing up loud enough it’s gonna excoriate the inside of your skull and it’s gonna do a damn fine job at exactly just that LOL – but Hybrid Noisebloom is perhaps not…

I’m a simple man: I see nylons on a harsh noise record, I press play. I’m not really sure why but the two things just seem to go hand-in-hand aesthetically. I’m not about to deep dive into the pleasing subconscious link between the two things, but I will say that this randomly-found compilation is a highly enjoyable listen, combing efforts from more well-known names of the scene with more obscure artists. At around 80 minutes…

Internally Mutilated play mama’s gooooood ol’ analogue gorenoise, drowned in a sea of tape hiss and bad samples from some Faces Of Death-sounding clips. The samples are like ligaments between muscle and bone (is that right? I’m not a medical expert lol) and make the bazillion songs on offer here flow together in one giant session, which is just lovely. Anal Birth being the same but more of the blown out speaker style variety, where…

Damn, this shit is all over the place! A blistering mix of blasting grindcore carnage and barrages of industrial noise, all chopped and changed up into glitchy, headache-inducing soundscapes. I guess think of breakcore techniques but applied to a slightly different musical landscape. (Recommended by kay192x, thank you!)

Underwhelming.com flash sale! Mesmeric Enabling Device sounds like lazy noise I used to make in my early 20s when I figured out how the paulstretch tool worked. Considering the names involved, this is heavily disappointing.

Long overdue rerelease of earlier Urinefestival shits. Expect gurgling toilet water vocals with farting, spluttering burps over the top of it, against the background of the “usual” grinding bass noise and spasticated flurries of drumming. 12 minutes of per audible degeneracy.

You can take one look at the staffing for this record and know immediately what kind of aural carnage you can expect. That being said, DHQ does have some sense of experimental maturity to it that I would not expect from something involving Seth Putnam. Anyway, if low, rumbling, post-apocalyptic sounds are your thing, then check out this improvised record.

I decided to spice up my life and go for a bit of variety and therefore selected a Vomir live album instead of a studio album. Now, I don’t want to take the piss out of Vomir. It is the project that introduced me to the strange world of “HNW” after all. Vomir has had some real world application for me (it is perfect for meditation, for example), but I fear that despite all of…

I first heard Barn Owl when they were announced for (I think) Roadburn 2012. I’ve been in love with Lost In The Glare ever since. Combining smoky, laid back rock with soul-gazing atmospheric drones, the album is an instrumental journey that is at times low-key and at other times all-encompassing atmosphere. Comparisons to Earth are apt, but Barn Owl really are their own interesting beast and one that I would heavily recommend checking out.

What the actual fuck is this? Off the strength of basically every single Mortiis side project (including earlier Vond), I got myself a copy of this on cassette. It’s a recent re-issue, but still. I wish I hadn’t bothered. This is easily the shittiest thing I’ve come across that’s got Havard’s name on it. Totally fucking pointless sound collages and minimal synths. It sounds like there has been absolutely minimal effort put into making this….

Morbid Beauty has some interesting noise going on. The general vibe is more of a moody one than of total aural destruction. Ecclesiarch is much more low key. Unsure if there is a volume issue on the cassette that I have, but this side is much quieter. Nevertheless, some of the passages do built into impressive introspective noise drones.

Very nasty, which is just lovely. Definitely on the grimier end of industrial techno. Doesn’t hit as hard as say, gabber techno, but still pushes sound to a fairly dark and brutal level, I’m sure that much can be gleaned from the artwork and song titles before even pressing play. Speaking of which, that artwork is very cool. Is it Pinhead smoking some harsh substance out of a bottle bong? I’m not sure. Either way,…

I’ve had this CD for donkey’s years but broke it out recently after the annoucement of the track listing for the new 2022 Swans album, The Beggar. The CD version of this album contains the apparent third part of the Body Lovers’ trilogy (part 2 being the “Look At Me Go” suite on disc 2 of My Father… from 2010 – which I also need to revisit). I’ve never been that hot on The Body…

Deep (I can’t help but think of The Boys’ character of the same name!) sounds more like a compilation than a unified full length, with a variety of sessions and sounds. Every time a new gorenoise blast comes in, it sounds like its a different recording from a different band or session – it’s all very disjointed. But this is gorenoise motherfuckers, so I doubt most if any people would be at all concerned with…

A bit of a non-starter, if I’m honest. The tracks take a very, very long time to get moving (I know this is the point), but when they do start doing something (the odd melodic riff echoing away in the background over the droning ambience), then it sounds pretty good. The only problem is that we have to listen to an absolute ton of go-nowhere ambience before reaching that point. I don’t dislike this because…

Enjoyable but somewhat predictable noise from this prolific project. I dig the aesthetic (this stuff just really works with noise music for some reason), but there’s not much in the way of variation here. And I don’t mean that in like, it’s just a slab of HNW – I mean that the record in general is a bit uninspiring for noise, unfortunately. There are loud bits, there are quiet bits, and there are some rumbly…

A pretty piss poor effort to be honest (no pun intended), especially considering the weight of the names involved. This goes absolutely nowhere and is over before you can really settle in and get involved with the noise (as ridiculous as that sounds).

Devil Master’s Ecstasies Of Never Ending Night was recommended to me as black metal with a little hardcore twist to it. I’d say that was a pretty fair assumption of the sound, for sure. The production is big and solid, which is refreshing for a band of this nature. Every now and then things slow down and devolve into a nice stomping riff. Tidy!

I gotta be honest, this is a massively irritating recording from the otherwise legendary Masonna. If you’re looking for irritating noise loops through delay pedals with distorted vocals over the top, then look no further. Otherwise, put this in the bin.

This is probably the crappiest Abruptum record that I’ve come across thusfar. When dealing with a band whose entire shtick is being crappy (albeit in a dark and evil way lol), then that can be really disappointing. Like getting an Agathocles 7″ where the recording is just so fucking bad you wanna throw the thing against a wall. Anyway, this release offers nothing to me. There’s no atmosphere, no savagery or seemingly any point to…

I’ll be completely honest with you: I was totally drawn into this by the art alone. That kind of chosen artistic representation for your sound almost guarantees you a select number of sounds, and power electronics is high on that list. That is, of course, what we have here. The trouble is, is that this is one of the cringiest things I have ever heard. Let’s get it out of the way: there is nothing…

A later-day effort from the legendary and enigmatic project that is Di6. Honestly, whatever weirdness the band is going for here completely misses the mark. Operation Hummingbird comes across more like a pointless collection of sound collages than it does a tangible album. Which is a bit of a shame, as the live album for this era is really good.

I would be lying if I said that I got into this on the first listen. In fact, it has taken me several years to even consider writing about it. In that time I have done countless relistens, and not once has this record landed with me. I’m not even really sure what it is about it that doesn’t gel with me, but there you have it. A pointless review but one I’ve been wrestling…

I remember years and years ago, when I was doing GCSE art. My teacher, someone who introduced me to all sorts of obscure shit like Unseen Terror for example, had this CD with him one day. He put it in front of me and said “what do you think that sounds like?”. I didn’t know what I was looking at back then, but the image of Douglas in that mask, holding a knife to the…

Very interesting harsh noise with plenty of atmospheric passages. Harrowing walls of distortion are permeated with – and often built up from – loops of peculiar noises; scrapes and clanking, metallic abrasions and explained emissions. This is the kind of thing I would like to see more of in noise. Ligature are not afraid to set a scene or built an atmosphere before getting to the heavy shit.

Dense, scouring (what appears to be) analog noise from Werewolf Jerusalem, to whose credit, their 15 minutes sails by as if I am being carried along on a haze of audible wire. Culver is more restrained, offering a similar length piece but of the atmospheric, ambient variety. Dark, menacing ambience of course, but not the kind that will knock you out of your seat. More the kind of menancing ambience that would be the soundtrack…

This little remix EP proved a rather difficult task to hunt down online, so I bought a physical copy. Yes, this idiot is buying CDs in 2022! Roll up roll up! Anyways, this is a completists item most definitely, featuring six remixes – and the original – of the title track. And that’s it. The art is cool as fuck, and the remixes from Kid 606, I Am Spoonbender and Bastard Noise are worthy of…

A dusty, reverb heavy full length of cataclysmic heaviness from Scotland’s Black Sun. I’m unsure whether these guys are still going or not but I consider myself lucky to have caught them live (a very long time ago admittedly). Industrial hellscapes are the order of the day, with guitars and drums being the vehicle, upon which a very tormented passenger (the vocalist) sits.

The first thing to notice about this second Rx remix offering from ANB is how insanely ferocious it is out of the gate. There was some harsh sounds on the first volume, but also a ton of moody offerings. Here, the entire ship is steered by none other than Delta 9, and only using (I believe) material from Altered States. So, taking both those things on board, it is hardly surprising that this thing rips…

15 traXXX in four minutes? Sounds about right to me, guvnor. Expect the wateriest, most ridiculous shifter vocals, and y’know what, some actually really well programmed drums. And that’s it. No guitars or bass or anything like that. Just drum programmed blasts and toilet vocals. This is gore (porn?) noise as God intende

This is probably the best live album I’ve heard from this project so far. It seems to offer something interesting aside from the usual 1 man acoustic renditions of all the hits. The recently deceased Albin Julius is a part of the live show, providing a layer of electronic sounds. This live document was taken around the Operation Hummingbird era, so that makes sense. But yeah, a lot of classics from various eras of Di6’s…

Pulse Demon takes the crown – or should I say the spotlight – when it comes to Merzbow’s most famous release. As the man transitions from the worlds of analogue into digital noise, we saw a bit of a shift in the sounds in general. This mid-90s period was specifically harsh. Venereology, which quickly followed that very famous Pulse Demon album, seems to step up the harshness, if you’ll forgive me for my lack of…

The Yacopsae stuff opening up this is clearly pushed to the front due to the underground weight that this act brings. However, it sounds like complete shit, if I can be so bold as to declare that in such an environment. LOL. But yeah, the Gdorks stuff that follows (RIP Katz) I’m pretty sure is the stuff from our failed split, which was also released on its own through Grindcore Karaoke. Here it is again,…

I got into a bit of a shit-slinging incident with a bunch of randos on the internet when Mortiis of all people, posted a picture of himself on his Instagram with who I could only assume from comments was the dude from Blood Axis. The guy had a shaved head, a t-shirt sporting the crutch cross, boots and a belt sporting the reichsadler eagle. Now, wearing boots doesn’t make you a Neo Nazi, but they…

I remember hearing this when it came out and struggling to really get my head around what they were trying to do. Personally, I’ve had a go at this several times over the year but have always failed to make it through to completion. Why am I still trying? Well, the concept of it is right up my street. Longform, intense songs covering a gamut of extreme metal genres, including other stuff like noise and…

Quite possibly the stupidest thing in my record collection, which is definitely the whole point of this thing. I remember, in the early 2010s, a race amongst the noisecore / experimental projects and labels to release the smallest record possible. Technically, RxTx’s Bleached Anus takes the win, being fully playable (if only for a few seconds) at 1.5″ in size. Esion’s 1.5″ however, is actually not playable at all, and is in fact, designed to…

VRV are one of those projects that is fairly awful on record but absolutely amazing live. Unless you have a particular penchant for drum machine fuelled noisecore with no direction or purpose, then please do not let me stop you. This 2008 CDr (I believe, from the man himself when I bought the VRV split with Agathocles) contains 2 sessions of improv madness, followed by an unlistenable live final session.

I’ve probably heard this AxCx session a thousand times as I had a download pack of all the old AxCx shit (I think from Agz’ (is that name right?) Crustorrents blog). Its abrasive, nasty and an absolute mess. Everything you want then, from a noisecore band – one of the genre’s founders, no less. It really says something about 7MON, when back to back to classic AxCx, you can truly appreciate just how noisy and…

Noise noise noise noise! All Dutch and Belgian bands here (or just Belgian maybe – I could be wrong). Permanent Death have always eluded me. I’ve always wanted to check them out because they have had both Tony from AGx (RIP) and Isaac from Fromtheashes and Leng T’che (and a bloody good bloke) on drums. Nonsensical noisecore is the order of the day here, as is much the case for LSD Mossel and De Madeliefjes….

I love Bastard Noise (or anything Eric Wood) but my experiences with his discography are few and far between. This is a fairly haunting session, where each band on the split sound fairly similar, but there’s a bit more dreadful atmosphere to the Bastard Noise stuff. L’Idiot Du Village (lol) is a bit more abrupt with the “song” lengths, but offers as equally pleasing a contribution of horrible noise. Tidy split!

I just love how confusing the Man Is The Bastard (Noise) AKA Charred Remains discography is. So… is this Man Is The Bastard? Or is it Bastard Noise? Discogs has Man Is The Bastard Noise looping back to Man Is The Bastard, but this record is clearly a noise release. Perhaps I’m just thinking too much into it. LOL. Either way, it is the crushing power electronics headfuck you can expect from these guys, with…

This was a project that I put together in late 2013. I’d decided that I wanted to do some gorenoise, but with the genre feeling rather saturated, I initially figured I’d fire up some “pornoise” shtick but eventually settled on using a bong for long, watery vocal effects. In fact, this was a ton easier than using actual pitch-shifted vocals. The bong is run through the same kind of effects that you would use on…

Abruptum’s initial legacy ended in the mid 2000s, but after a few years hiatus, the member known as “Evil” returned without founding member “IT” (Information Tech? – these fuckin’ names, man) and released new material under the Abruptum name, even though, realistically, this should have been called something else entirely. However. This is fucking great. Potestates Apocalypsis (you know its grim and evil if the name is in fuckin’ Latin) is actually really, really good….

How is this 9 years old? The time, she flies! I used to trade a lot with the Fuck The Industry label from Japan, who at the time were putting out some of the highest quality home made releases I’d seen. It goes to show how much difference can be made by investing in a decent printer (lol) – all of FTI’s stuff looked the part, both on CDr and cassette. Video Nasty (not to…

Wow. There’s something humbling about listening back to old noisecore stuff. There always seems to be an element of fun involved with just getting into a room, or switching on your board setup, and giving everyone’s ears hell. When I listen to raw rehearsal recordings, which is the case here with the Final Exit stuff, I feel like I’m given an unique window, a fly-on-the-wall look into a rehearsal room full of friends messing about…

Strong, dense industrial combining the more harrowing elements of the genre with something altogether more classic (that being the pummelling heave-ho motion and delivery of early Swans). It uses such as a backbone to create seemingly lawless noise, which is often allowed to run rampant and unstructured with abandon, but here it is pinned down like a worm on a dissection plate and we are able to peer into it. You’ll surely remember what Nietzsche…

Well then. This is certainly on the fringes of the bizarre. Not your typical noisecore, the uhh, lovely-named Abortion Breath instead employs electronic elements in their noise. I knew this before hand, thanks to Choppin’ Headz zine, and I expected some sort of Gorgonized Dorks approach to pummelling your senses, but this is totally, completely different. Pulsing, headache inducing electronic beats are used as “songs”, often accompanied by short bursts of anguished vocal barks. File…

The record title is something that should be lifted right out of bestial black metal, but we are firmly in the camp of The Rita’s intense, steady noise torture here. This record conjures all sorts of unpleasant moods and vibes, and I would expect no less. Definitely for power electronics fans only, however.

Chiwawawawa are from Manchester and play an interesting blend of noisy rock and a slightly more melodic vein of indie music. Without wanting to be derivative or to put these guys in a box, Violent Architecture has an awful lot of Black Midi vibes, and the final track has parts that sound as if they are lifted directly out of Swans’ “Bring The Sun”, but this is so blatant it simply must be some sort…

I reviewed parts 1 and 4 of this series back what must be, shit, 8 years ago now, and I figured I had lost parts 2 and 3 to time, but I recently managed to unearth them from a long-forgotten drawer somewhere. The crap you accumulate around you, eh? There’s far too many entries in this series to mention, but at least I can round off the ones that I physically own. Stirner is pretty…

The name of this record sums up the sounds within almost perfectly. What a crazy mess of sound. In the best way possible, of course. Part of it grinds on my patience, part of it feels amazing to be listening to.

A seldom listened early Swans effort for me, which is a shame because there are some cracking renditions here. Granted, Real Love will almost always be overshadowed by Public Castration, but Real Love has, dare I say, slightly more audible and “less punishing” versions of a few of the same songs. Of course, this is 80s Swans we are talking about, and the music is inherently uncomfortable, but these are less tortured than Public Castration….

I believe British Piss Culture is a project of Derek Crozier, the fella behind the Vile Noise label. Deluge then, is vile noise in more ways than one. Expect nought but a single pummelling noise wall that is here to frazzle your brain and force you into submission, or something. Hey, if you’re going to be pissed on, this is a pretty good soundtrack to go with it.

Another record that I have unceremoniously sat on for about 7 years. The Coming Age is a full length from one man noise maker Seige Electronics released on the excellent (and now possibly defunct) Vile Noise label from Scotland. Anyway, there’s some really cool textures here, and the whole thing sounds alive and analogue. There’s some horrible subject matter to confront and some intense vibes, but confrontation in this way is part of what power…

I’m unsure why Stalaggh changed their name to Gulaggh. I should do a search and find out why, but I’m not really that interested. The main real difference is that the Gulaggh project, or Vorkuta at least, is far less focused on the noise aspect of the group’s sound, and more so on the screaming and wailing supposedly delivered by patients at a facility for mental health. Or whatever. We’ve all heard the story of…

Sixth House Is Risen is a little experiment I made out of noise loops, synthesizer apps and a little box of fun called a Korg Monotron. Honestly, there’s hours of fun to be had with one of these, and Varken was a project born to release some of the noise I’ve made. It certainly helped whilst working from home in the original pandemic, where internet issues were rampant and I had a lot of downtime…

Absolutely legendary but in reality, utter garbage noisecore from Japan’s infinitely-influential The Gerogerigegege. Tokyo Anal Dynamite is seemingly considered a stand-out release from this project (if there can be such a thing), but honestly, I’ve heard better. I suppose, realistically, in this kind of thing, the major difference between albums is the production used to record the carnage, rather than the “music” itself. There’s a fair chance I’m thinking way too much into things. This…

I have no idea where I got this CD from, but the contact address is from South America. I can’t ever remember recieving any parcels from South America, so truly, fuck knows how I go this. The beauty of trading, eh. So, after fuck knows how many years in my possession, I finally span this CDr. Unfortunately, at 2:48, the thing obliterated itself inside my car stereo. How my car’s CD player is still working…

The sampling on the Kots Donor tracks is pure freakery; I wish I knew what the guy was saying! There definitely seems to be a whole lot of the Mortician thing going on (long sample, tiny track) but all in all this is quite enjoyable for mindless gory noisecore. VRV is, well, true to his sound, for lack of a better way of phrasing it. I love this shit; it is horrible, harsh and repetitive…

RxAxPxEx did this absurdly noisy split with Absurd God. I got given this years ago, so passed on the love and gave it away to a colleague who was collecting cassettes in my previous job. It had a lovely yellow colour to the cassette. Nowadays I’m back to collecting cassettes, so it sucks I gave this away, but what can you do? This is blocked on the Discogs website, which made me worry if someone…

What I’ve dug out here is the two disc version of Hole In The Heart, a haunting masterpiece of early Ramleh. Whilst not as aurally punishing as some of their works, Hole In The Heart instead focuses on how power electronics can create intense atmospheric soundscapes. There is a mournful aspect to the record that I can’t really do justice with words.

Picked one of these up on cassette recently as I couldn’t remember the last time I bought anything noise-related on tape. Plus, y’know, its always good to support new labels. This is wall noise at its finest, you really don’t need to look past Vomir when it comes to this subgenre (not to undersell everyone else involved – myself included) – but White Widow is worth a goose too. For the most abstract noise fans…

Human Atrocity is the bigger, better sounding brother to the band’s self titled release a year previous (its also the name of the 12″ record released not long back that includes both of these releases – confusing!). This is, unless I’m wrong, where the pitchshifter sound first was heard for LDOH? Which is cool to know, considering how much of a staple it would become. There still doesn’t seem to be any descernable riffs or…

The fuck did I just listen to? It’s over in about 30 seconds, so it really is a bizarre assault on the senses. I think, at that length, I’ll just leave this here for you to click on, if you dare. https://archive.org/details/AAR00035

Ah, gotta love this. LDOH’s recent record and reformation had me looking back at the old stuff, and I went all the way back to the first demo. Its just bass, vocals, and horrendous noise. Sounds like Fear Of God meets 7 Minutes Of Nausea and is a far-cry from the gore stuff that would soon follow. Noise history here!

Faces Of Gore is an old Marc Palmen project (LDOH / Urine Festival). Here, reprinted as a split with Biocyst is the almost impossible to find demo entitled Bradyurethrorrhoea. Its not a far-cry from Urine Festival, or one of Bobby Maggard’s infinite gorenoise projects. It is sloppy, disgusting, and fantastic. Biocyst on the other hand, seem really familiar to me but I don’t think I’ve ever heard them before. Honestly, its more of the as…

I had to check this out simply because of the name attached to it. Grainy pictures of prostitutes (mangled or otherwise) is a solid trope of the noise or power electronics worlds, but what can I say, I’m a sucker for everything exploitation. Aurally, The Dawn Of Sleaze is rather disappointing in a bash-your-pretty-skull-in way, instead opting for the intestinal massaging of what are almost walls (but not quite). There is some variation, but for…

And so ends the journey into the world of dementia, as led by The Caretaker. Part 6 is utter chaos and confusion (for the most part, at least), a fitting end to this harrowing project. How accurate is this? Who knows, especially for a story told entirely through the medium of sound. Either way, one must heavily commend The Caretaker on his monumental effort, and of course, for the light and focus that he has…

Nonsense of the purest, highest degree. I’m not really sure what is going on here, but this is pretty terrible all round. I love black metal, noise, grind, the lot – but this is MySpace bedroom-era trash. https://archive.org/details/AAR0073

Ah, Pulse Demon. There aren’t many stand out individual noise records. Bands, sure, but individual records? There aren’t that many. Pulse Demon is probably one of the most instantly recognisable, but is it one of the better offerings from Merzbow? And why is it so popular? Well, for starters, its got everything from the Merzbow project. It captures – from the prime era – all of the project’s great attributes. It’s not as intensely incinerating…

Pharmakon is a lass that knows how to invoke a creepy atmosphere or six. Long before Lingua Ignota brought screaming into the mic under the mainstream light, Pharmakon was churning out gorgeously disgusting power electronics like it was nobody’s business. What I love the most about Pharmakon is that there is no need to wallow in the depths of endless distortion in order to create chaotic or unsettling soundscapes. Yes, these are often clear and…

I heard you like foot fetish oriented slabs of crushing noise, bro? No? Oh. Well, The Rita brought some anyway. I have a rip of this on my computer and I have absolutely zero idea where it came from haha – either way its a lovely harsh massage of the senses. Its impossible to keep abreast of The Rita but when our paths do cross I always enjoy the experience.

Don’t you just love it when something sounds exactly like how the name makes you think it will sound? As far as I’m aware, Lair Of The Black Blowfly is another Bobby Maggard gorenoise based project, of which I’m of the opinion that the world simply cannot have enough of. This is a clever and almost artistic approach to the sheer sheets of noise that we are used to, where themes (and sounds, in the…

What a noisy little fucker this is, falling more into the harsh noise camp rather than the harsh techno camp. Is this techno? Fuck do I know about electronic music? Not much, thats for sure. What I mean is, Tollund Men has that pulsing body-moving hypnotic throb to a lot of their stuff, but its buried under 16 layers of grime on this cassette.

Some lovely head-buzzing drones from the earlier portion of the Sunn O))) discography. “Mocking Solemnity” and “Death Becomes You” are excellent offerings, as is the uhhh, interesting take on Metallica’s “For Whom The Bell Tolls”, which is of course, completely and utterly unrecognisable. The biggest drawback with this album is the middle two collab tracks. I love Sunn O))), and I love Merzbow, but fuck if these works are not irritating as fuck. The second…

What a trip. Balanced between elements of harsh noise and creepy atmospherics, Haraam’s awkward, lurching electronics transcend out of the audible mire, writhing into shapes of pulsating body music. Hypnotic, danceable, weird and unsettling. I’m in love.

I stumbled upon the second part of this collaboration at the beginning of the year so it was high time to go back and hear the genesis of it. Atsusaku is stacked, 2 huge back to back slabs of droning and sparkling industrial noise to cleanse not only your aural palette but also portions of your brain. Its impossible to tell who is doing what here, but this is a solid noise release if I’ve…

I’ve been a fan of the hyperblasting froguencies of Phyllomedusa for some time now, so it was excellent news all around when I found out they would be doing a split with the lovely chaps in Catastrophic Blunt Force etc. etc. etc.  The Phyllo stuff is harsh and perfect for inner skull excoriating or some such horrendous practice. I may be biased in regards to my relationship with CBFx, but they offer something different to…

It’s nice to see something that bridges the gap between industrial, power electronics and harsh noise so perfectly. Often these terms are bandied about wantonly, with several terms being used to describe the same thing in a pedantic circle jerk of an already restrictive genre. Whilst I still don’t quite know what the fuck Witch House is supposed to be, I can literally feel the industrial vibe pouring out of this record, like steel girders…

Unsettling and disturbing as always, SJ embark on yet another plunge into the depths of humanity’s darkness. For all the storytelling that makes you feel like you want to take a shower, Offal is actually quite a pleasant listen. The noise on offer is clearly harrowing in its origin; it feels like there is a prolonged screaming suffering mangled through the tracks, but in such a way that it is delivered almost like a purifying…

Ignoring Lost Corridors’ segmentation into tracks, one finds that it works better as one whole piece. Echoic, dense, reverb-heavy atmospheric scores are the order of the day. The name Lost Corridors is very apt; I feel like I’ve wandered into a crack in the earth’s surface and am descending into the pits of Agartha.

What is the perfect soundtrack for painting a skirting board I hear you all ask at once? Why of course, I answer, it is head-scraping harsh noise from Japanese Torture Comedy Hour and Muzumuzu Suru! I can’t claim to own this tape, but some kind soul has uploaded this to YouTube so I am finally able to enjoy this long-lost relic of power electronics. I can’t seem to find much info on Muzumuzu Suru, but…

Prurient is fuckin’ great, JK Flesh is fuckin’ great. Then, of course, naturally, this split is fucking great. It’s a match made in heaven, where the more pulsing, driven body music of the Flesh meets the sheets of noisy experimentation of the ‘rient. Truly, madly, a good ‘un.

Children, for my lack of any understanding of the noise scene, appears to be a project between Genetic Noose and a fellae named Gaeme Baillie. I had a chuckle to myself thinking the Children material here sounds a bit like Arab Strap recorded an album whilst in the middle of a severe bout of alcohol-fuelled manic depression. Either way, it’s miserable as sin and fucking angry as fuck. What more do you want from your…

Dogs Blood Rising was my first experience with the work of Current 93. The record threw me at first, as there are no songs per se, just large, meandering passages of sound collages. “Falling Back In Fields Of Rape” heavily scratched my de ja vu (turns out the Death In June song with the similar title / lyrical layout to this is a “cover” of this ginormous undertaking of a track). All in all, Dogs…

Holy shit, this is nihilism distilled into raw sound! At about 6 minutes in length, Money Hater really doesn’t fuck about on this 2016 EP. I was expecting some sort of powerviolence (by looking at the sleeve) but the harsh noise here melted my face in the best possible way. 6 minutes of sheer armageddon, get in!

Ut Strepitus play slow, evolving soundscapes of noise and dense atmospheric ambience. The shtick is a heavily Latin-based BDSM theme, something of course which has been seen in noise and power electronics worlds before, but not so much maybe in the atmospheric, ambient or synthesiser worlds. The moods and tones shift from paranoia and dread, to small moments of wonder and contemplation, before oppressing drones of collapsing atmosphere suffocate you under its weight. There is…

Like A Lamb To The Slaughter was the short-lived original direction of my Panties project. It had such a simple name that I couldn’t get out of my head, I had to try and make some noise that was oppressive and fetishistic (is that a word?) to accompany and suit the name. I’m sure others who revel in the pits of noise music have these same itches right? Like, the name comes first, and then…

Before Godflesh, there was Fall Of Because, from what I can tell a fairly short lived project when members were also involved in Napalm Death or Head Of David. Featuring a trio of which would collaborate freely in the coming years, Fall Of Because plays bare bones industrial rock, where the incredibly influential noise from New York’s Swans had been trickled through Brum’s own industrial culture. It’s not quite Godflesh yet; think early Swans meets…

I’ve been on a bit of Prurient kick recently, enjoying a few of his records. Cocaine Death however is one that has been saved in my Spotify list for years now. I’m not sure what it is, but I really love the aching melody that creeps below the surface of harsher noises. Cocaine Death toes the line between sonic destruction and ambient beauty.

Prurient exists in his own class within the noise world. That sounds a bit up his arse, but the project toes a fine line between beauty and chaos, between the fragile and the concrete. This balance of opposites is as clear on Frozen Niagara Falls as it is in any of Prurient’s other work (that I’ve heard), and at an hour and a half in length, it is a mammoth double album journey through ice…

I suppose this could be categorised as true industrial music? I am instantly reminded of the group called Stomp that we used to watch videos of as a kid. All sorts of machinery and noises are utilised to create bizarre mechanical soundscapes. Fireworks (I think? Ha!) and the scrape of metal on metal is the order of the day, resulting in the beauteous song of the furnace at work. Good stuff. 

The sounds of industrial landscapes are sourced and re-purposed into collages of weaving, constantly collapsing slabs of freeform noise. This is the second such collab between Merzbow and Davis. Bonus points from me for using the title “Inland Empire” for the final track.