reviews: industrial

(industrial / noise / power electronics)

Des Esseintes – Les Diaboliques

Although I missed the concert by Des Esseintes a while back here in the Netherlands, I heard quite some positive feedback on his performance. This made me quite curious about the album I’m reviewing here. The cd comes in a white digipack which is decorated with black and white pornographic pictures, both contemporary as well as some older ones…

V/A – Fuck

Hive Records is specialising in dark electronic music. Of course this still describes a broad range of music, from dark ambient to power electronics to idm. But Hive does indeed cover this whole range, from trippy to harsh. Even though the title and cover of this compilation will have you believe otherwise, this compilation-cd does cover the same range of music…

Anus Solaire, L` – Orifices

When I received this cd and noted the name of this project I found it to be something between stupid, hilarious, and disgusting. After looking a bit closer by checking out their website and the accompanying booklet I came to understand a bit what the philosophy behind this project is…

Folkstorm – Sweden

I guess everybody in the ambient-industrial-scene is familiar with Henrik Nordvargr Björkk. For all I know, he began his music career with the quite satanic Cold Meat Industry-act MZ (Maschinenzimmer) 412. Since then, he evolved as an underground artist, released under the moniker Folkstorm about nine albums, had some records released under his own name, and composed the Sleep Therapy-boxset…

Fire in the Head – Ignite/Submit

Seven tracks of raw powernoise in the vein of MSBR and Slogun: that is what’s presented to you in the form of a fairly new project called Fire in the head. From track one ‘Ignite/ Submit’ to track seven ‘Enough of you for both of me (v.1)’ the listener is confronted with waves of distortion and aggression. Is it original and new? No…

Merzbow – Rattus Rattus

I have to admit that I’m not a great admirer of noise, especially not of ‘japanoise’. Harsh industrial acts can bring me some kind of destructive satisfaction, but when comes to totally chaotic, unstructured sound-madness: I rather get away from it. I must also admit that I don’t even believe that there are people who like noise musically…

Kobe – Economy of movement

Kevin Dunn is the man behind the project Kobe. A man who is, according to his bio, active in the underground ‘experimental’ music scene for years. He joined the band Loretta’s Doll in 1991, and studied martial drumming for quite some time. He also founded the label Middle Pillar Records…

Barzel – A shield of defence and the word of the son of blood

At least here we have a power-electronics project that we can not accuse of being nazi’s. ‘Militant Jewish industrial’ is Barzel’s (= ‘iron’ in Hebrew) monicker. The project is fiercely inspired by the idea of Zionism (‘the national movement for the return of the Jewish people to their homeland and the resumption of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel’)…

Grey Wolves, The – Division

Besides Con-Dom and Genocide Organ, The Grey Wolves have quite a reputation as purveyors of ‘cultural terrorist’ power electronics. It’s one of the reasons why cult lp’s such as ‘Catholic priests fuck children’ and ‘The age of dissent’ make large amounts of money on eBay. The Grey Wolves have quite a discography, but they have never bothered to renew themselves ‘noisically’ nor conceptually…

Gruntsplatter – The passions of a cripple

Gruntsplatter was started by American Scott Candey from the USA in 1994. He has been involved in numerous other projects, labels and magazines in the underground industrial scene, but Gruntsplatter is probably his main vehicle. I have heard only a small part of his extensive output, but the Gruntsplatter music I heard was usually dark and atmospheric, somewhere between noise and ambient…

V/A – Steinklang industries Disco 1994-2004

A very cheap label sampler to get better acquainted with the Austrian label Steinklang and the acts on their roster. Steinklang was founded in 1992 and has been pretty productive since. They specialize in power-noise and death-electronics from Austria and Germany…

V/A – Sweetness will overcome

Segerhuva, which has released about a dozen releases now, can perhaps be regarded as the naughtier little cousin of Cold Meat. The label is also from Sweden and specializes in dark industrial/ambient recordings. Furthermore various artists on Segerhuva have also been involved on Cold Meat releases. This compilation gives a good view on what Segerhuva stands for…

Child Patrol – Come now little ones

This noisy cd is the first release of Mal’occhio, a small mailorder based in Amsterdam. It comes in an original looking cd-tray of a kind I haven’t seen before. The outside does not give away much background information, except that the music was recorded in ‘the Boyroom’ back in 1999. I have been told that it is Per Åhlund aka Diskrepant who is hiding behind Child Patrol…

Offizial Propagande – …Oh, the Humanity

Offizial Propaganda is an Italian power electronics act with a strong apocalyptic and martial feel. Titles like ‘Final Solution’ and ‘Long live death’ may give you an idea of the direction of this album, which is devoted to the exploitation of mankind. They deal with politically uncorrect themes in an ironic manner, take for instance the title ‘White n#ggers’…

Mueller, Jon – What’s lost is something important…

Packaged in a seven inch sized sleeve comes this creation by experimental sound wizard Jon Mueller. It’s his first solo release, after various collaborative efforts. This release on Crouton contains two long tracks of seemingly improvised minimal soundscapes based on percussion, with a dronelike effect…

Post Scriptvm – Marginal Existence

In a wonderful, special cardboard packaging with great, yet macabre artwork comes this album by Post Scriptvm, which I knew from earlier recordings on Somnambulant Corpse and Stridulum Recordings. This time the project from New York has found shelter at the French label Hermetique, which earlier brought us Propergol amongst others…

Censor – Empire holds down

This is an album that really travels the borders of many different musical styles: heavily drum’n’bass influenced industrial, with some powernoise, some hardcore, some orchestral music, indeed totally eclectic. And an eclectic style that works very well, especially on the first four tracks of this album…

Morgenstern – Two Different Faces

If I would describe this record in one word it would be: intense. Not just because of the loud noises and harsh distorted beats, but also because of its atmospherical, even ritualistic aspects. Two Different Faces is a very well chosen title for this album. The rhythmic noise side of Morgenstern is fully integrated with their dark melodic side…

Telerotor – Mobilität

Telerotor is a project by Roger Rotor and Telepherique. This second album is a conceptual record dealing with mobility and its effects on people and their daily lives. The artwork of this cd is really wonderful. It is a beautiful digipack with a pop-art-like design of a train in the Swiss (?) mountains on it. There is also a nice booklet with pictures from old trains and modern highways in it…

Genocide Organ – In-Konflikt

Genocide Organ is a true cult act since the mid 80’s. This German project has always been consistent in creating extreme industrial noise and power electronics, both on record and on stage. GO has a controversial image because they’re consistently dealing in an uncomprosing manner with politically uncorrect subjects involving all sort of political extremism and cultural terrorism…