The home for Frayed, a London-based noise project: frayedexpressions.bandcamp.com.
This is a space for various musings on albums, films, books or politics; as well as frequent updates on the progress of Frayed.
BONJOUR! It's been a month of heathen discoveries, amplifier worship and industrial revolution for me, as I've delved into some dark recesses of rock lore, and subjecting my ears to a nice racket along the way...
First up, it's an avalanche of decibels and sa turation, as seminal stoner-doomers OM are back!!! And in truly blissful fashion. God is Good (Drag City; September 2009), despite its dubious (for an atheist like me anyway) title, is a massive step forwards for Al Cisneros' outfit. Many were dismayed when righteous drummer Chris Hakius, whose monumental, non-stop, skin-pounding and cymbal-crashing had been such a key to the OM sound, left the band. How would Cisneros manage to keep the momentum built up by three stunning albums? OK, I'm less keen on Pilgrimage than on Conference of the Birds and Variations on a Theme, but still, OM had defined such a distinct style and sound, it was hard to see Cisneros maintaining things after Hakius' departure. The answer is by recruiting a drummer just as sensitive-yet-fucking-heavy in the form of Grails' Emil Amos. For many, the subtle shift in playing styles between Hakius (more monolithic) and Amos (more of a "licks" player) is tantamount to heresy, for me it allows OM to take themselves to a new level, with a more sophisticated, adventurous sound, incorporating sitar, keyboards and wind instruments. Yet at no point is this to the detriment of the sheer volume and power of OM's sound, as Cisneros' unholy bass ploughs a dark furrow over which his weird, pan-religious vocals take flight on the wings of Amos' polyrythmic drumming. It's at it's most impressive on the titanic "Thebes", but throughout God is Good, OM reach heights that they hadn't visited since the first track off Conference of the Birds. Righteous, I tell ye!
Of a much darker, even evil vein is Khanate's last album, the monstrous Clean HandsGo Foul (Hydra Head; May 2009). Khanate were a doom supergoup, and for purists of that particular (and peculiar) genre, remain something of a holy grail and, since their split circa 2006, a lost treasure. Clean Hands Go Foul is therefore a posthumous release, and one that came at just the right time to satiate lamenting Khanate fans. Well, sort of. Truth be told, more than a few would have been -and indeed were- put off by Clean Hands Go Foul. Because it's a huge step away from the primeval stomp of the band's debut. A power shift in the band saw prolific guitarist Stephen O'Malley, quite often busy with a multitude of projects such as his main band Sunn O))), black ambient outift KTL, or the simple running of his label Southern Lord, take something of a backseat on this opus. As such, Clean Hands Go Foul is much less immediate that Khanate, with more room made for bassist James Plotkin's glitch and ambient experimentation and Alan Dubin's anguished vocals. So the spaces that were already present on the band's first two albums are stretched out even further, with Tim Wyskidia's drumming becoming more scattered, even infrequent, and Dubin's wild howls and pained shrieks (still among the most stirring and affecting vocals in rock history) are pushed forwards, only intermittently interspersed by bursts of O'Malley's distorted guitar. So, fans wanting more extreme-and-demented-but-still-somehow song-based epics like "Under Rotting Sky" and "Pieces of Quiet" will have been disappointed (though the new direction was already esquissed on their horror-doom sophomore effort Things Viral - also a classic). Things get most extreme and damn-near unlistenable on the 30+ minute long "Every God Damn Thing", where minimalist glitch and drone wash out of the speakers EVER. SO. SLOWLY. while Dubin pierces the hum with burst of high-pitched screams and Wyskidia occasionally wakes up to smatter our ears with jazzy drum patterns. It's definitely too long, even for me, but I keep coming back. I think it's Dubin's voice. He is surely one of a kind, every roar, shriek and rasp containing more pathos than a hundred soft-rock whingers. So, a tough album, but one I deem essential (like all Khanate releases, the packaging is also amazing). This is a band looking beyond the confines of pure metal, taking as many cues, if not more, from Derek Bailey or Evan Parker as they do from Black Sabbath or Neurosis. They'll be missed.
Also assaulting my ears this month was Justin K Broadrick's Jesu, whose latest album Infinity(Avalanche; July 2009) has been getting a bit of a pasting in most quarters. Not me. In many ways, it might just be JKB's most powerful and complete statement to date. The problem is that its qualities can also be its flaws, and plus, most people want music, not statements. Infinity is long. Long. Long. Long. Long. One track. 49 minutes of music. It takes a lot of effort to take in, as JKB, operating alone and playing all instruments, shifts tempos and emphasis throughout, bringing in keyboards and electronics to add to his roaring guitar, moving effortlessly from doom-laden metal crunch to moments of graceful ambience. It's a compelling journey, but just that - a journey. Maybe too much for most Jesu fans, though when I heard it played in concert (in part - he's not a sadist) I was enthralled. JKB is a man of vision, and Infinity is a vital stage of that vision.
After so much crunch and thunder, I was little prepared for what hit me when I pushed Orthodox's latest opus, the wonderful Sentencia (Alone; August 2009), into my CD player (well, my Mac Book - how times change). Their first album, Gran Poder remains one of the best recent doom albums, heavy and morbid, but with touches of jazz subtlety and some of the weirdest, most cavernous vocals ever recorded. Heavy but with brains, and deservedly hailed by the likes of Julian Cope and Dusted. On Sentencia, the vocals are still there, maybe even more so. The singer sounds like he's just been woken from centuries of suspended animation, much like the zombie Templar knights from Amando de Ossorios "Blind Dead" series of Spanish horror films. But here's the thing: the avalanche-like drums and guitars crunch of the first album (I have to confess to not having heard the second) are pretty much gone! Which is not to say that this album is wimpy or, worse, all acoustic (I hate it when metal bands do that; except Tenhi - Tenhi rule). Au contraire, Sentencia is mighty in the most primeval sense. Taking the doom template, Orthodox strip it down, turn to instruments like the piano and the trumpet in addition to bursts of guitar, thumping drums and saturated bass, and deliver one of the greatest leaps forward in modern metal history. It's a fucking shame this album will go mostly unnoticed, as this could be a watershed moment! It's much like Khanate's revamping of their doom sound with jazz textures, only Orthodox haven't even bothered with much distortion or saturation and take the jazz and folk links to the ultimate summits. And the vocals have less to do with Alan Dubin's primal howl than with the ancient chanting of medieval monks. This is metal experimentation, metal by way of David Sylvian or Otomo Yoshihide. Fabulous, truly fabulous.
So, after subjecting my ears to full volume sonic assault at the hands of these dommsters and stoners, I of course decided the best thing to do would be to delve into the no-less extreme universe of Industrial music. I'm like that you see.
The trigger for me was the double purchase of "Wreckers of Civilisation", Simon Ford's excellent book on COUM Transmissions and Throbbing Gristle, and the band's second live compilation, Live Volume 2, 1977-1978 (The Grey Area, 1993). The book is a fascinating insight into the genesis (pun only possibly intended) and history of this most seminal of British post-punk bands, from their debuts as a provocative performance art group to their notorious career as sonic terrorists and agents provocateurs of the new genre known as Industrial. The live album is just as essential. I plumped for it as a fan of that particular period in the band's career and wasn't disappointed. The audience is, as with nearly all TG live recordings, completely inaudible, either drowned out by the sheer volume of the band's mechanical sound, or dumbfounded into silence by the outlandish non-music being vomited forth from the stage. TG were not your usual band, more a loose collective of contrarian amateurs who used self-built machines or machines they couldn't master to blurt out a sound that was meant to mirror the dark, post-industrial netherworld they felt they were living in (given they were based in run-down Hackney, the sound was apt): harsh, violent and robotic. On tracks like "Tesco Disco" and "Urge to Kill", the musical trio of Peter Christopherson, Cosey Fanni Tutti and Chris Carter propel the tracks forwards on vibrating customised synths and distorted guitar whilst singer Genesis P-Orridge barks out twisted, mean lyrics like some weird cross between Iggy Pop and Hitler. Other tracks are more ambient, lengthy swathes of electronic noise that bludgeon listeners into submission. It's perfectly nasty, or nastily perfect.
This rediscovery (of sorts, I've always been fascinated by TG, just went through a period of preferring Cabaret Voltaire and Suicide) has come at an opportune moment, as late last year the band re-recorded their seminal debut as the The Thirty-Second Annual Report of Throbbing Gristle (Industrial Records; 2008). Not as immediate as its original, of course, but it is certainly more than a lazy re-hashing. The tracks are all drawn out and extended, with the added bonus of better sound quality than Mute / Grey Area's rather dull CD reissues of the band's back catalogue in the early nineties. As such, Carter's pulsating mechanics and Tutti's buzzing guitar are thrown into sharp relief. This is one to be played loud.
I also decided to augment my collection of TG-related CDs by investing in their second album, the controversial (the cover pictures a young girl lying on a bed and exposing her knickers, whilst a photograph in the booklet shows the same girl sitting topless and grinning) D.o.A - The Third and Final Report (Industrial Records, 1978). It's a much more mixed bag than either their debut or 1979's Twenty Jazz Funk Greats (Industrial Records, 1979), with each member providing a solo track as well as the bundle of collaborations. The band was collapsing under the strain of their fractuous personal relationships, not helped by the demise of Tutti's relationship with P-Orridge and her affair with Carter. P-Orridge was becoming more paranoid, taking on most of the band's publicity and as such his lyrics, already sombre, became downright ferocious, taking in murder, mutilation, infanticide and the desperation of his newfound loneliness (particularly powerful on "Weeping", loved by Ian Curtis). Songs like "Hamburger Lady", "Hit By a Rock" and "Dead on Arrival" rank among the best the band ever recorded. Others, such as IBM or their 16-second reworking of their minor hit "United" are less interesting and so much filler. And filler is not a word I'm used to using with Throbbing Gristle. Even the less arresting tracks of The Second Annual Report (Industrial Records; 1977 - still their masterpiece) and 20 Jazz Funk Greats could never described as filler or dull.
Plunging into the history of Industrial music has allowed me to discover a whole wealth of bands beyond Throbbing Gristle. There's Cabaret Voltaire, of course, but I intend to do a wee post on them alone, as my big musical love of the year. Suffice to say no record collection is complete in my mind unless it includes Mix Up, Voice of America, Three Mantras and Red Mecca. But beyond the Sheffield trio, there are even more treasures. Take 23 Skidoo's all-too-brief debut Seven Songs (Fetish; 1982). The title's a lie - there are 8 songs, but they are all fast-paced and maximum only 5 minutes long, making this more an EP than an actual album. But it's still a classic. Taking TG's love for powerful and discordant electronics, but adding some funky percussion, 23 Skidoo took industrial into more commercial, but still powerful waters. In fact, at times Seven Songs is the most futuristic of the early industrial albums, echoing the early Human League with its synthetic bleeps and bloops and Kraftwerk with its robotic vocals. But fear not, on tracks like "Porno Base", its industrial credentials ring loud and clear, with dark electronics, mean vocals and a wry sample of famed "morality" campaigner Mary Whitehouse. It's certainly better than the similar Thirst (Fetish; 1981) by Clock DVA.
Altogether more sinister and sombre was Australian band SPK's Leichenschrei (Side Effects, 1982), one of the standout post-Gristle industrial releases. SPK were far darker and more contentious than 23 Skidoo, Clock DVA or even Cabaret Voltaire, with horrific posters and record covers that evoked the nastiest aspects of TG's oeuvre -and therefore human nature- even leaning in the direction of perennial shock masters Whitehouse. But the music on Leichenschrei remains perfect, comprised of brutal power electronics, harsh sounding rhythms and disturbing sound effects. This is music for downtrodden social outcasts, the insane and the lost, its icy atmospheres conjuring images of rain-swept streets in abandoned industrial zones, or run-down surgical clinics in some Miike-esque horror movie. Descriptions of autopsies, illnesses, testimonies by medical abuse victims or the insane (including the immortal line "The manager of the corporation tried to give me syphilis by wiping his cock on my sandwich") and crashing mechanical effects drift in and out of SPK's driving nightmare-scape, as unrelenting as Peter Brotzmann's "Machine Gun" and far more abrasive. For me, Leichenschrei is the true child of TG's Second Annual Report, one of only two records that approaches the masters' magnum opus for quality and force.
The other comparable record coincidentally also features a German title, but we have to zip across the Atlantic to get a taste of it, something actually near-impossible today as this album is pretty much lost now. The band were called Factrix, and are these days the stuff of legend, their influence and mystique far exceeding their sales. In such circumstances, the actual product can often prove to be overhyped and a let-down once finally listened to, but there is not such problem with Scheintot (Adolescent, 1981), which may just be one of the greatest "rock" albums ever made. Although, to call it rock is one hell of a misnomer, just as The Second Annual Report was a long way from rock tradition, owing as much to the avant-garde and drone as it did to three-chord r'n'r. Factrix were from America's most out-there city, San Francisco, and, like Chrome or The Residents, reconnected the New Wave's contrarian attitude with the psychedelic spirit that had imbued California's rock since the mid-sixties. I would even go so far as to say that psych was a key component of early Industrial (Genesis P-Orridge would actually name-drop Frank Zappa in interviews), as the sheets of pulsating noise would, like the best psych, mess entirely with the synapses of these bands' audiences. And "pulsating" is the perfect word to describe the sound of Factrix, whose dreamy, ghost-like songs featured montonous, watery (honestly the best word!) rhythm patterns from a clapped-out drum machine, washed down by throbbing bass lines and swathes of distorted electronics and fucked-up guitar drones. As with SPK and TG, the general atmosphere on Scheintot is oppressive and grim, epitomised by the superb cover artwork. The vocals are hushed and snarling and the whole thing is permeated by a sense of dread and menace. It remains one of my favourite albums of all time, and it's a travesty that it remains unavailable to this day.
But Clock DVA and 23 Skidoo were showing the way when they incorporated metallic percusion into the harsh industrial soundscapes of their peers. Soon SPK and the likes of Test Dept. were doing the same and industrial music became more driving, more percussive, even dancey in places (this is the point that Cabaret Voltaire lose me...). Taking this to similar extremes as Throbbing Gristle and SPK did with electronics, German band Einsturzende Neubauten created one of the biggest splashes of the time, with their monumental debut Kollaps (ZickZack; 1981). It's one of my favourite albums of the eighties, and a true masterpiece of harsh, claustrophobic rock at its most extreme. Forgoing traditional "rock" instruments, Blixa Bargeld (a future occasional Bad Seed) and his madcap cohorts used nothing but power tools and sheets of metal to create the unhinged and violent musical backdrops for Bargeld's hoarse and raw primal scream vocals. This is most effective on the opener "Tanz Debil", a strangely groovy track but one that also disturbs and assaults with uninhibited angst; whilst "Steh auf Berlin" is more experimental, kicking off with the screech of a power drill! The title track is equally stunning, industrial blues like Free filtered through Killing Joke. If I'm truly honest, Kollaps gets a bit weaker towards the end, but the force of its first tracks and its general atmosphere of hysterical anger make it essential listening.
Industrial music is a difficult and punishing genre, and one that has evolved enormously over the years, getting simultaneously more extreme and more commercial in parallel strands. It has an amazing power to evoke atmospheres of urban decay, twisted mechanics and social angst. The albums I've been listening to this month are just a smattering of the early classics, and I haven't even had time to listen to much Coil, Test Dept. or early Current 93. Maybe for December. For people into this kind of extreme music, I recommend the following blog: http://undergroundmusiclibrary.blogspot.com. Very interesting!
The last album that has been spinning away in my head is Lou Reed's Metal Machine Trio's The Creation of the Universe (Sister Ray; 2008). Available only through Reed's website, it's the recording of a live gig made in LA of this singualr new project that appears to have re-invigorated the former Velvet Underground singer. The Metal Machine Trio is comprised of Reed on guitar, Ulrich Krieger on sax and Sarth Calhoun on Fingerboard Continuum and live processing. Both Reed and Krieger also drone away on electronics. The album is comprised of two near-hour-long improvisations, that segue gracefully from minimalist drone to distorted noise to avant-gardist free jazz. It's a mesmerising concoction, unpredictable but engaging, the kind of hypnotic drone that sends me into raptures. It's a long and challenging listen, but I could not recommend it enough and it could just be the best album of the decade.
Have a great December, and Merry You-Know-What one and all!
So, the wonderful forums on Head Heritage's website have set the site's numerous visitors the double challenge of naming one's favourite 20 albums of the noughties, and 25 faves of all time.
A near-impossible task, but the kind of geeky challenge I love, so after much pain and soul-searching, here goes, bearing in mind that I hate myself for leaving out a wealth of bands:
1) Top 20 albums from 2000 to 2009:
- Boris: Flood (2000)
- Godspeed You! Black Emperor: Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven (2000)
- Khanate: Khanate (2001)
- Acid Mothers Temple and The Melting Paraiso UFO: Univers Zen ou de Zero a Zero (2002
- Songs: Ohia: Didn't It Rain (2002)
- Jesse Sykes and the Sweet Hereafter: Reckless Burning (2002)
- M83: Dead Cities, Red Seas and Lost Ghosts (2003)
- DNA: DNA on DNA (2004) - all recorded in 78-79, but this only came out in 04, a first for most of the tracks, certainly on CD
- Wilco: A Ghost is Born (2004)
- Ilyas Ahmed: Between Two Skies (2005)
- Antony and the Johnsons: I am a Bird Now (2005)
- Mono & World's End Girlfriend: Palmless Prayer / Mass Murder Refrain (2005)
- Om: Variations on a Theme (2005)
- Richmond Fontaine: The Fitzgerald (2005)
- Baikal: Baikal (2007).
- Burial: Untrue (2007)
- Fuck Buttons: Street Horrrsing (2008) - Tetragrammaton: Elegy for Native Tongues (2008) - To Blacken the Pages: A Semblance of Something Apertaining to Destruction (2008)
- Teeth of the Sea: Orphaned By the Ocean (2009)
It's in chronological rather than preference order, as it's easier and it wasn't specified. Again, I left out so much I wanted to cry. Apologies to Sunn O))), Earth, Patrick Wolf, Ladytron, David Sylvian, A Silver Mt Zion, D'Agostino, Foxx and Jansen and The Heads...
2) Top 25 albums of all time:
1. Neil Young: On the Beach 2. The Velvet Underground & Nico: The Velvet Underground and Nico 3. Television: Marquee Moon 4. Joy Division: Closer 5. PiL: Metal Box 6. Amon Duul II: Yeti 7. David Bowie: Low 8. The Stooges: Funhouse 9. Slowdive: Pygmalion 10. Love: Forever Changes 11. Factrix: Scheintot 12. Bob Dylan: Highway 61 Revisited 13. My Bloody Valentine: Loveless 14. Japan: Tin Drum 15. Throbbing Gristle: The Second Annual Report of Throbbing Gristle 16. Funkadelic: Maggot Brain 17. The Cure: Pornography 18. Ash Ra Tempel: Ash Ra Tempel 19. Gene Clark: No Other 20. Tony Conrad and Faust: Outside the Dream Syndicate 21. Yoko Ono: Plastic Ono Band 22. Comus: First Utterance 23. Boris: Flood 24. King Crimson: In the Court of the Crimson King 25. Antony and The Johnsons: I Am A Bird Now
I have to go now, or I will definitely be changing some, if not most of these. Don't hate me Fela, Miles Davis, Tangerine Dream, Cabaret Voltaire and Flower Travellin' Band!!!
Hello, my non-existent readers! This is my latest scheme for this most redundant of websites: every month, I will give a little overview of the music I have been listening to thus far that month. I can't really claim any credit for originality, of course - Julian Cope's been doing it in his monthly "Drudions" for years now!
But hey, it wouldn't be a good idea if it wasn't worth nicking, so I'll claim it's me paying homage to the great Arch-Drude. As with every month, October 09 has seen me swallowing up ever more music, and some of it -nay, most- has been downright amazing. Whether I've been saturating my senses with high-octane noise, or settling down on a rainy autumn day to the soothing tones of some vintage ambient, the thrills and chills and excitements have been numerous. So, um, here goes!
First up, let's pursue the Cope kissing and shout out to the immense Elegy for Native Tongues (Subvalent) by new Japanese outfit Tetragrammaton. Cope has made it his album of the month and as often his judgment proves impeccable. The man has a great word for good music: he calls it "useful", and it definitely applies to Elegy for Native Tongues. This album will take you on journeys, fuck up your system and have you yelping with surprised delight with every shift and turn of its improbable evolution, from experimental and rock-ish on the first studio disc, to the wonderful melding of pagan drone and scattered free-form fire music on the live CD. I'm sure there have already been albums that mixed free jazz and drone, but I have yet to hear one do it this convincingly. The live CD is the clincher. Tracks start out like early Taj Mahal Travellers psych-drone, before manic chanting, rabid percussion and blasted white noise seep in to fuck things up in the most beautiful way imaginable.
Two bands I've grown very keen on also released new stuff in October.I was most keenly looking forward to Fuck Buttons' follow-up to their superb Street Horrrsing album from last year. On first listen, barring the stunning opener "Surf Solar", I wasn't that taken with Tarot Sport (ATP Recordings). The harsh and distorted vocals that defined tracks like "Sweet love planet Earth" and "Ribs Out" on the debut are completely absentto be replaced by a greater emphasis on highly compressed electronics and trance-like grooves. And it has to be said, Tarot Sport isn't as good as Street Horrrsing. But it grew on me, and now I find I'm listening to it pretty much every day. "Surf Solar" is literally amazing, a seriously groovy psychedelic techno monster, whilst the middle two tracks "The Lisbon Maru" and "Olympians" display a soaring, fragile grace close to that of Shoegaze masters My Bloody Valentine and Slowdive, with the same inherent sense of melancholy. The rest is less arresting, but "Olympians" in particular is amazing.
I was not quite as excited by the release of Tortoise's new album Beacons of Ancestorship (Thrill Jockey), mainly because you can never be sure what you're gonna get with this most unpredictable of American bands rather foolishly lumped under the banner "post-rock". Actually, scrap that - few other bands have gone so far beyond traditional "rock" as Tortoise, so maybe they, as opposed to Explosions in the Sky, are the true embodiment of post-rock. Beacons is a weird little album, not as immediately stupendous and radical as their magnum opus Millions Now Living Will Never Die, but it does present a band in constant evolution, completely unafraid of pushing themselves and taking their music into new places, in this case, a strange, pent-up hybridization of rock, kraut-funk and buzzing electronica. Check out the fabulous "Prepare Your Coffin", surely one of the tracks of the year.
People who know me will tell you that I'm rarely up-to-date with new releases, preferring in general to scour the annals of popular musical history to unearth gems from decades past (or more recent, but still old releases). This month is gonna be no exception, although the first non-October 09 release I'm gonna now talk about only dates back to 2008! A Silver Mt Zion (here named Thee Silver Mt Zion Memorial Orchestra and Tra-La-La Band to add some confusion) are one of the most-loved and also most-criticized of the numerous Godspeed You! Black Emperor offshoots. And 13 Blues for 13 Moons (Constellation, March 25 2008) was particularly vilified. But as I was never massively taken by their earlier, mostly acoustic chamber music sound, the fierce energy of 13 Blues for 13 Moons was a very pleasant surprise. Sure, it's pretentious and overblown at times, but unlike most, I like Ephrim Menuck's ragged voice, it adds a sense of high drama to the band's already fierce vibe. This is a weird and hard-to-classify mix of metal and post-rock, and it's actually very effective.
But, quite weirdly, the focus of most of my musical consumption has been a country that I rarely find very good at providing the world with useful and mind-bending rock: France. But then again, that may be because when it does, no-one, especially in France it appears, seems to take notice. So imagine my shock upon discovering that two amazing artists recently discovered, Dashiell Hedayat and Catherine Ribeiro both hail from the land of frogs' legs and camembert.
In Hedayat's case, I should have known better than to be suspicious. After all, his backing band is fucking Gong! I don't understand the bad press Gong get. I would have thought the likes of Julian Cope (him again!) would love their primeval psych jamming, but apparently they get strapped with an unfair "silly" tag, whereas I see them more as a wigged out, slightly untamed garage-psych gang, witha rather sinister undercurrent. Differences in perception, maybe. Either way, on Obsolete (Shandar Records, 1971), Gong lay down a series of psychedelic blues grooves and wild jamming over which Hedayat intones weird spoken-word lyrics. Influenced by William Burroughs' cut-and-paste writing technique, Hedayat's words are odd, funny, even creepy, making him the perfect foil for Gong, a band I've always found to perfectly balance wackiness and edge. Closer "Cielo Drive" is 21 minutes of molten freak-out that would make Acid Mothers Temple proud. Probably my album of the month.
Catherine Ribeiro, with her fantastic backing band Alpes, provided a similar melding of psychedelic rock (albeit of a folkier vein) and metronomic rhythms inherited fromGerman bands such as Can, Neu! and Ash Ra Tempel. But, where Hedayat delivered his lyrics in a clipped spoken word style, Ribeiro was blessed with what may be one of the most powerful voices in rock music history! Her first steps came in the folkier Catherine Ribeiro + 2Bis, whose self-titled debut (Disques Festival, 1969) was at times fierce and expansive, but more often owed too much to the prevailing folk-pop French music style called "Ye Ye" (and which is majoritarily vile). However, when the slightly sprawling +2Bis was disbanded and the core retained as Catherine Ribeiro + Alpes, a huge sea change occurred in Ribeiro's sound. Her voice was pushed forwards, the sound was stripped down to a vicious garage-psych-kraut thunder and her lyrics became more intense and profound. Their first record, N.2 (Disques Festival, 1970) was a huge leap forwards from Catherine Ribeiro + 2Bis, and one of the most powerful French albums of the early seventies, rivalling Gainsbourg's Histoire de Melody Nelson in sheer intensity. Some of the guitar rivals Edgar Froese's mental slide bursts on Tangerine Dream's debut Electronic Meditation and Ribeiro's gothic wail is simply stunning, particularly on the 18-minute monsterpiece "Poeme Non-Epique". Only the rather vacuous instrumental "Preludes" stop this album from being a true classic. But no worries - Ribeiro and co. got it absolutely right on their third album Paix (Phillips, 1972), a four-track epic of almost titanic proportions. It's a genre-defying, unpredictable and overpowering album, where repetitive rhythms (the drums sound like a drum rhythm machine) and fiery droning folk-rock melodies create a huge canvas for Ribeiro to scream out her manic lyrics like a truly fucked-up opera singer. It's punk before punk, much in the same way Yoko Ono or Neu! were.
Speaking of fiery and intense music, I also heavily recommend Joe McPhee's wonderful Nation Time (CjR, 1971 - superbly re-released by Atavistic in 2000), a 3-track live album I recently discovered thanks to Philippe Robert, a French author who writes awesome books tracing seminal underground, black music and experimental albums. Joe McPhee is a little-known free-jazz saxophonist who here uses his intuitive meld of hard-bop and free-form experimentalism to mirror the recent civil rights struggles that had been gripping America. And "gripping" is a good word for this tight, powerful and inventive jazz masterpiece that has managed as quickly as Art Ensemble of Chicago's Les Stances a Sophie (Pathe, 1970, recently remastered by Soul Jazz) to hoist itself into my top 10 jazz albums of all time. And if you can get Les Stances a Sophie as well, you'll be truly blessed, because it is also a classic display of super-competent musicians mixing fire music into catchy jazz and delivering pure gold. Pluss, you get to hear soulful Fontella Bass howling "Your eyes are two blind eagles/That kill what they can't seeeeeee!". Wild.
But, for all my love of jazz and weird French folk-rock, I have to admit that what has mostly been assaulting my ears in October was post-punk, that most nebulous and far-flung of musical genres. First I gorged on the magnificent -and mind-bogglingly extensive- compilations of No-Wave acts DNA and Mars. I'm not usually a fan of comps, but neither of these two manic bands ever left a fully-fledged album behind them. Which is a real shame, as both were perfect examples of this short-lived late-seventies fusion of extreme noise, avant-garde and fiery post-punk. In both cases DNA on DNA (No More, 2004) and 78+ (Atavistic, 1996) showcase just about everything these two hard-edged, arty acts laid to tape, and for every "What the fuck???" track there are three or fours masterpieces of dark, untidy and fantastic adrenalin rock. DNA were something of a no-wave power trio, with either spongy bass or pounding (and pounded) keyboard lines thudding away behind Art Lindsay's razor-sharp guitar riffs and howling vocals. Mars, though, remain my favourites from the movement. Their primeval riffs and driving percussion make them some sort of perverse blues band, the nastiest bluesmen (should say women -3/4s of them were female!) ever to lay their chops (if they can be called that!) on vinyl. A much welcome collection. My other post-punk obsession these days has been the lesser-known acts that graced Manchester's uber-famous label Factory, home to Joy Division and New Order. After A Certain Ratio and The Durutti Column, the next most important band on Factory's roster was Section 25, an outfit from Blackpool centered around the Cassidy brothers, Larry and Vincent. On their excellent debut Always Now (August 1981), they channeled a similar dark vibe that their buddies Joy Division had, but with a more stripped-down, funk-tinted sound and, if possible, even more detached vocals. Of course, the Cassidys didn't have the songwriting talent of Ian Curtis, but tracks like "Friendly Fires" and "Dirty Disco" join the dots between cold wave and PiL's dark experimentalism, making Always Now an essential album. Crispy Ambulance were also unjustly compared to Joy Division, despite not actually sounding much liek Curtis and co. Their debut, The Plateau Phase (1982) actually owes more to Van Der Graaf Generator and other experimental prog outfits, except that Crispy Ambulance also inject throbbing cold wave bass and Eno-esque dark ambience. They probably lacked a truly great singer, a la Curtis or Devoto, but The Plateau Phase remains seriously underrated. But perhaps trumping them both was The Temple of the 13th Tribe (November 1984) by least-known Factory act The Royal Family and The Poor. Essentially a one-man band centered around esoteric singer Mike Keane, TRFATP was influenced by the writing of Aleister Crowley and occultism, as well as Durutti Column minimalism and Joy Division's dark meanderings. Opener "I Love You (Restrained in a Moment)" is gentle and mysterious, but tracks like "Voices" and "Radio Egypt crackle with moody tension and dark fantasies. Meanwhile, "Discipline" is a great dance-punk track, like Eurythmics jamming with New Order. And, lest we forget, let me highlight Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark's superb debut, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (1980) also released on Factory (complete with a lovely Peter Saville cover), which remains to this day one of the defining synth-pop albums, a bubbling, effervescent and experimental triumph that perfectly melds punkish energy and futuristic wistfulness. "Electricity" and "Julia's Song" are electronic classics, hoisting this debut to the rank of one of the most underrated early synth-based pop albums, alongside Japan's Quiet Life and The Human League's Travelogue.
Just quickly before I give this rambling a rest, just a quick note on a trio of movies that have also graced my grateful consciousness over the last 30 days (you can watch movies on iPods, now, apparently, so this is not quite off-topic). First up, in theatres. In the lovely Curzon Soho cinema on Shaftesbury Avenue, I was given a lovely treat in the form of Andrea Arnold's hard-hitting and bittersweet sophomore film Fish Tank. Featuring a superb central performance by newcomer (and bona fide estate lass) Katie Jarvis, it's a biting, harsh, but ultimately humane and uplifting look at one girl's struggles to deal with her upbringing in run-down Dagenham. Arnold confirms the talent she already displayed on Red Road and sets herself as one of Britain's best ever directors. No less gritty, but much more fanciful, was George A Romero's Martin (1977), which I acquired on DVD on a whim. Damn - if only all my whims were so reliable! Martin is a dark and urban take on the vampire myth, turning the whole thing on its head by injecting more than a little doubt as to whether or not the anti-hero is truly a vampire. He certainly thinks so as does his uncle, and he likes to kill women and drink their blood, but he can go out in the day, doesn't have fangs and is indifferent to crosses and garlic. A smart and disturbing exploration of illusion and psychology, Martin is actually one of the best horror movies ever made. And again, I then made a rather radical leap, turning from creepy gore horror to one of the most celebrated gay-themed movies of recent years - Sebastien Lifshitz's Presque Rien (2000), an intense love story focusing on two very different teens who fall into a steamy romance whilst on holiday. The premise is simple, and allows Lifshitz to focus on the chemistry between his two excellent leads (Jeremie Elkaim and Stephane Rideau). It's very sexy and uncompromising, and as far removed from the cliches of queer cinema as you can get.
Well, so ends my first monthly blether. So far, as November has got underway, I've been indulging my industrial and psych tendencies, so expect to hear about Throbbing Gristle, SPK, Einsturzende Neubauten, Zappa and Soft Machine next month!
Pain Jerk + Emeralds - The Luminaire, London, January 24th 2009
I walked into this one more than a little bit innocently, having never heard anything by either band. But I'm a lover of drone and noise, and The Luminaire is in my neighbourhood, so it seemed like an opportunity worth seizing.
I wasn't disappointed by Pain Jerk. You have to hand it to them - the Japanese are masters of noise! From Les Rallizes Denudes to Merzbow, Fushitsusha to Mainliner, they have become experts at distilling ferocious guitar and computer saturation and vicious sound patterns. Pain Jerk, a forty-something longhair who uses a weird metal plate and his laptop to create a massive wall of unfettered, brutal noise, deserves his place alongside these greats. I have never been so grateful for ear plugs, and I'm pretty sure this was the loudest gig I'd ever been to. Bludgeoning, unrelenting, vicious - and only one sodding track! It all seemed a mess at first, but by letting the noise roll over me, I became aware of shifts and tempos in the miasma, and I am pretty sure that Pain Jerk's compositions require as much skill and expertise as the most virtuoso free-jazz.
As such, the more tranquil ambient-drone of Emeralds seemed a bit tame by comparison. They only had 40 minutes or so, and decided to dedicate them to one track as well, one that built up wave-upon-wave of keyboard drones and synth washes, punctuated by some rather ill-fitting guitar noodlings. Sadly, just as they seemed to get locked into some sort of Tim Hecker-ish groove, the track was over, leaving me, and my friend John Paul, feeling a bit deflated. After the sheer brutal power of Pain Jerk, Emeralds felt like an anti-climax. Not bad, per se (though, seriously guys, lose the Santana guitar), just a bit generic.
Still, the experience of Pain Jerk left me buzzing, and the Luminaire is a fantastic location, one of the best joints in London, despite an apparent curfew. Makes me proud to live in Kilburn.
The Equinox Festival - Conway Hall, London, June 13th 2009
A serendipitous find this, as I'd never heard of this festival until I perused a copy of The Wire magazine in Sister Ray (one of the best record stores in London, by the way). Discovering that a very recently-reformed Comus were going to headline the saturday, I immediately grabbed a ticket, although could only push to the one day, meaning I sadly missed John Zorn, Aethenor and Arktau Eos. Dammit!!
The Equinox Festival is a weird one. As well as music, there are screenings of bonkers movies, and talks given by people well-versed in subjects like magic, the occult, alternative sciences and heathen cultures. It's all very long-haired, platform-booted and chant-y, with some very curious characters, including real-life druids and "sorcerers". I even saw a guy with feathers in his hair wandering around barefoot clutchin an ornate walking stick. All very intriguing, but I did feel a tad out-of-place.
After the disappointment of not being able to watch Alejandro Jodorowsky's Holy Mountain due to a DVD failure, I got my first blast of heathen magic through a performance art, um, performance by Equinox organiser Raymond Salvatore Harmon, who improvised weird multi-coloured video projections whilst a buddy blasted out distorted free-jazz trumpet solos. A real first in my live music experiences, the closest being the afore-mentioned wild noise gig by Japanese freak Pain Jerk in January.
But the music remained the highlight of the day. First up was Italian noise/drone artist K11 (aka Pietro Riparbelli) who uses radio signals to create drawn-out drone opuses that seemed to seep out over the audience like black sludge. His distorted vocals and weird sounds were meant to evoke the ghosts of Alistair Crawley (K11's -excellent- album was recorded in the famous "satanist"'s former house in Italy) and it was a deeply fascinating and unnerving performance. Sadly for him, though, he was outdone by Jex Thoth's occasional backing musician Burial Hex, who came over from his native Wisconsin to saturate our senses with heathen noise and warped vocals. His use of upright piano added a sense of melancholy to his unholy screams and fucked up computer sounds, making him one of the highlights of the whole evening. A nice change after the unmemorable Yan-gant-y-tan who preceded him. Shame he wasn't given more time, as he was replaced after 30 minutes or so by the slightly peculiar, and ultimately unsatisfying Kinit Her, who had some good ideas, and a decent mix of dark folk and angular rock, but ultimately failed to capture an audience by now crying out for Comus.
And the veterans didn't disappoint! It helps that chanteuse Bobbie Watson's looks and voice are still impeccable, even at 50+. And their sound is still as vital and arresting as ever, as they blasted their way through a complete rendition of seminal album First Utterance. All were in fine voice, their twisted, evil psych-folk songs sending the audience into raptures, despite the occasional sound problems. Lead singer Roger Wootton howled away like a man possessed, whilst guitarist Glenn Goring showed he has lost none of his virtuoso touch. The stand-outs were the heavily percussive freak-out "Drip Drip", "Diana" wherein Wootton and Watson's voices blended to tunning effect, and the desperately beautiful "The Herald" that showcased Bobbie Watson's uniquely ethereal voice. It was all over too soon, and I have never seen a bad so delighted -and surprised!- by an applause than these guys were as they basked in the rapturous adulation of a packed Conway Hall.
All in all, The Equinox Festival was an odd experience, one I'll definitely repeat and one that more people such as Julian Cope need to tune in to and promote. It stands as a real alternative to the morass of crappy mainstream junk out there.
Hard Rock Calling - Hyde Park, London, June 27th 2009
Of course, I was there for Neil Young. The great man was appearing in London yet again, and there was no chance I would miss it, despite a raging hangover and no-one to go with. I don't need to go on about how much I love Neil Young. I've already waxed lyrical about his Hop Farm Festival gig (still the best one I've ever seen) and lauded his underrated Year of the Horse album. And if I'm honest, the rest of this day of Hard Rock Calling was a bit, well, shit.
The Pretenders, led by the ever-sexy Chrissie Hynde tried their best with their souped-up boogie, but it was too early in the afternoon and my head felt like my eyeballs were trying to force their way out of their sockets. A big yawn for Ben Harper, who was energetic but really needs someone to tell him his songs are forgettable. And fuck off with the Jesus bollocks! Fleet Foxes were cruelly unsuited to the venue. I can't say I've been swayed by the hysteria surrounding these guys, but even I could tell that their mostly-acoustic folk-rock was never going to be pacy or energetic enough to capture an audience of what? 10000? So they tanked. Aside from Neil, in fact, only The Magic Numbers, headlining the second stage, really shone thanks to an honest and high-energy set that was as endearing as it was fun.
So, mildly nonplussed, I pressed my way towards the main stage, constantly reminded via shoves, insults and flying beer that mainstream London audiences are basically made up of cunts. But Neil didn't disappoint. Part of me thinks this gig may even have been better than the Hop Farm one, and that I just couldn't properly appreciate due to the dickheads that were bulldozing their way through the crowd (almost causing a riot) and the fact that I was still suffering from my self-inflicted ailment.
But Young balefully smashed through his set, blasting out all the greats: "Cinnamon Girl", "Down By The River" (yet another monstrously long version - I never get tired of it), "Hey Hey, My My", "Fuckin' Up" and more. I felt for the people staying in the numerous adjacent hotels, as surely the wailing and screaming of The Loner's faithful Old Black must have had their rooms shaking. The band was as tight as ever, the acoustic interlude mercifully brief (in my condition, I needed NOISE!) and his transcendent riffs and liquid solos made my irritation towards my fellow festival-goers seem miles away.
And, after pummeling a molten version of "Rockin' In the Free World" into the ground (you had to be there, it was hilarious - every time we thought the song was up, he'd launch right back into the chorus like a belligerent child), he was off. But not for long. He came back on, talked mysteriously to someone in the wings, then launched into current favourite encore song "A Day In The Life" (by the Beatles, for all the morons out there). And mid-way through, who the fuck should bound on-stage? Of course, his royal tweeness himself, Paul McCartney! I've been a big fan of Beatle Paul, but his appearance sent the audience into raptures and I have to admit I was one of them. It was a delirious moment, made even more so when Neil started wigging out on guitar and Macca himself prosternated himself before the Great Canadian. Seems everyone that night was aware who is the greatest singer in the world. And no, it wasn't Beatle Paul!
Oneida + Teeth of the Sea + Mugstar - The Garage, London, August 18th 2009
OK, admission time. I didn't fork out my £10 to go and see the headliners on August 18. I went for Teeth of the Sea, whose debut album, Orphaned by the Ocean, may just be the best album of 2009. I'd already seen them once, in January, when they'd be waaaay down the billing at The Hoxton Square Bar and Kitchen behind some crappy Horrors wannabes and shitty indy-pop bands. TOTS had blown me away to the point that I was booing the other acts who had forced these minor geniuses off after just twenty minutes.
So there was no way I was going to miss the chance to see a bit of a longer gig. Their appearances are too seldom to justify that. And they would be opening for Oneida, a band I knew little about and couldn't wait to discover.
Both were awesome. My friends and I did have to sit through the tiresome metal-psych wobblings of Mugstar, distracting ourselves with lashes of beer at the bar, but once TOTS came on, I was running straight down to the front to take in their sound.
It's a hard sound to describe. Taking their cues from Fuck Buttons, TOTS are great at creating mind-numbingly loud noise-fests, the kind that batter you to the ground and warp your senses. But they're also subtle and emotional, with jittery, nervously angular guitar, washes of synth, krautrocky percussion and, weirdest of all, trumpet all bursting through the noise to take the listener into some sort of weird modern psych or prog, the true definition of modern music!
Again, the performance was awesome, all four guys standing in a line bashing out the most outlandish art-punk-prog heard since the heyday of Krautrock. But again - too short! They were off after only 4 (admittedly amazing) songs! I know good things are supposed to come in small doses, but come on!
So, I retired to the bar to drown my disappointment, and it was from this vantage point that I was able to watch Oneida blow the place away with their raucous heavy-psych. Personally, as much as I liked their drum-heavy, driving rock, I felt TOTS still had the edge in terms of inventivity and innovation. But, it's hard not to like Oneida, with their swirling light show and literally amazing drumming (think Klaus Dinger meets Bill Ward). And I've since gone out and bought their very excellent Pre-teen Weaponry album, and it's great!
But again, I cannot recommend Teeth of the Sea enough. if you have a chance to go see them, don't pass it up. I know I won't. Roll on November the 20th!
Jesu + Kayo Dot + Caina - The Luminaire, London, September 18 2009
And so, back to Kilburn's immortal Luminaire (I'm praying the rent doesn't go up on the place, especially with Grouper still to appear this year) for a concert I'd waiting seemingly years for. JESU!!! Former Godflesh overlord Justin K Broadrick has made Jesu his main platform these days, taking in heavy-metal of the doomiest kind and adding elements of ambient, psych and shoegaze for a seriously heady cocktail. His latest album, Infinity, is a 50-minute one-track opus, and I was keen to see how he would translate this very studio-minded approach to the stage, especially as he would only be joined by trusty bassist Diarmuid Dalton. What, no drums??
First up was the very forgettable Caina, who by their own admission were crap and had hardly ever played any gigs. 'Nuff said, really.
I was excited to see Kayo Dot, who have made a name for themselves as a very intelligent and well-crafted blender of post-rock and seething metal. Sadly, two out of five of them had failed to be allowed into Britain, meaning their sound was more than a little stripped down as a result. The guy from Caina helped out briefly on drums, but fans of a bit of crunch (and I could tell there were many, it's a fucking Jesu gig after all) would have been very disappointed. Kayo Dot's sound was more akin to jazz or experimental music, with snaky guitar, gentle percussion and very dominant keyboards and violin. An excellent sound, that I was enjoying mightily from my little perch at the edge of the stage, but one probably more suited to the Purcell Room or Cafe Oto than the Luminaire on a night one of modern metal's darlings is performing. The guys with their long hair, scraggly beards and Godflesh t-shirts seemed mightily bemused!
And then -bang on time- the main man was there, setting up his own gear to rapturous applause. JBK is an imposing chap, with his crew-cut hair, massive Dr Martens and baggy jeans. And that's even before he brings out his monstrous seven-string guitar and humungous pedal box!
What followed was awe-inspiring. Using a computer to generate any missing sounds, including drums, JBK stormed his way through a monumental set, lifting classics from his first two albums and lesser-known lights from his EPs. "Conqueror" and "Friends Are Evil" were my highlights, the sheer volume adding extra weight to his mournful tunes and saturated guitar. JBK proved his class on the axe all night, extricating a whirlwind of distorted solos and thundering riffs from his axe like a latter-day Jimi Hendrix, stomping back and forth on the stage and banging his head away as he mauled the strings. Even technical issues with one of the monitors didn't stop him thrashing, growling and roaring, watched by the stoical gaze of Dalton. At the end, the latter left the stage, leaving Broadrick to blast out the rippling, saturated excess that is "Infinity", in a shortened version. It's a guitar masterpiece, ever-shifting, ever-unpredictable and a great way to end a rip-roaring gig.
Thanks for reading...
What I'm currently listening to:
Kayo Dot: Choirs of the Eye (2003, Tzadik) - Inspired by the gig, I thought I'd give this much-lauded debut a whirl. Very experimental and wistful, I'd rate it a 4/5
Serpentina Satelite: Nothing to Say (2008) - Wonderfully dark and hard psychedelia. The shorter songs don't really do it for me, but the three long ones are as good as at-their-peak Ash ra Tempel, I kid you not! Surely a 5/5
The Wake: Here Comes Everybody (1985, Factory) Melancholy synth-post-punk that doesn't ever reach the heights of Joy Division, Section 25 or New Order, but does include the marvellous "O Pamela". 4/5
Kousokuya: 1st (1991, remastered 2003, PSF) Hugely underrated Japanese freak-metal, in the vein of Fushitsusha and Mainliner, and easily as good as both. A definite 5/5
Sergius Golowin: Lord Krishna Von Golocka (1973, Kosmische) Typically spacey, blissed-out kraut-folk with weird spoken word passage and fucking Klaus Schulze on keyboards!! 4/5
Plus: A Silver Mt Zion, Tortoise, Fuck Buttons, Ascend, CAN, AR & Machines, Kaoru Abe, Love Live Life + 1, Greymachine, Wild Beasts, The Heads, The Royal Family and The Poor, Crispy Ambulance, KTL and Oneida!! Get'em all!!!
avalanche of decibels and sa
Go Foul (Hydra Head; May 2009). Khanate were a doom supergoup, and for purists of that particular (and peculiar) genre, remain something of a holy grail and, since their split circa 2006, a lost treasure. Clean Hands Go Foul is therefore a posthumous release, and one that came at just the right time to satiate lamenting Khanate fans.
Also assaulting my ears this month was Justin K Broadrick's Jesu, whose latest album Infinity (Avalanche; July 2009) has been getting a bit of a pasting in most quarters. Not me. In many ways, it might just be JKB's most powerful and complete statement to date. The problem is that its qualities can also be its flaws, and plus, most people want music, not statements. Infinity is long. Long. Long. Long. Long. One track. 49 minutes of music. It takes a lot of effort to take in, as JKB, operating alone and playing all instruments, shifts tempos and emphasis throughout, bringing in keyboards and electronics to add to his roaring guitar, moving effortlessly from doom-laden metal crunch to moments of graceful ambience. It's a compelling journey, but just that - a journey. Maybe too much for most Jesu fans, though when I heard it played in concert (in part - he's not a sadist) I was enthralled. JKB is a man of vision, and Infinity is a vital stage of that vision.
h crunch and thunder, I was little prepared for what hit me when I pushed Orthodox's latest opus, the wonderful Sentencia (Alone; August 2009), into my CD player (well, my Mac Book - how times change). Their first album, Gran Poder remains one of the best recent doom albums, heavy and morbid, but with touches of jazz subtlety and some of the weirdest, most cavernous vocals ever recorded. Heavy but with brains, and deservedly hailed by the likes of Julian Cope and Dusted. On Sentencia, the vocals are still there, maybe even more so. The singer sounds like he's just been woken from centuries of suspended animation, much like the zombie Templar knights from Amando de Ossorios "Blind Dead" series of Spanish horror films. But here's the thing: the avalanche-like drums and guitars crunch of the first album (I have to confess to not having heard the second) are pretty much gone! Which is not to say that this album is wimpy or, worse, all acoustic (I hate it when metal bands do that; except Tenhi - Tenhi rule). Au contraire, Sentencia is mighty in the most primeval sense. Taking the doom template, Orthodox strip it down, turn to instruments like the piano and the trumpet in addition to bursts of guitar, thumping drums and saturated bass, and deliver one of the greatest leaps forward in modern metal history. It's a fucking shame this album will go mostly unnoticed, as this could be a watershed moment! It's much like Khanate's revamping of their doom sound with jazz textures, only Orthodox haven't even bothered with much distortion or saturation and take the jazz and folk links to the ultimate summits. And the vocals have less to do with Alan Dubin's primal howl than with the ancient chanting of medieval monks. This is metal experimentation, metal by way of David Sylvian or Otomo Yoshihide. Fabulous, truly fabulous.
was the double purchase of "Wreckers of Civilisation", Simon Ford's excellent book on COUM Transmissions and Throbbing Gristle, and the band's second live compilation, Live Volume 2, 1977-1978 (The Grey Area, 1993). The book is a fascinating insight into the genesis (pun only possibly intended) and history of this most seminal of British post-punk bands, from their debuts as a provocative performance art group to their notorious career as sonic terrorists and agents provocateurs of the new genre known as Industrial. The live album is just as essential. I plumped for it as a fan of that particular period in the band's career and wasn't disappointed. The audience is, as with nearly all TG live recordings, completely inaudible, either drowned out by the sheer volume of the band's mechanical sound, or dumbfounded into silence by the outlandish non-music being vomited forth from the stage. TG were not your usual band, more a loose collective of contrarian amateurs who used self-built machines or machines they couldn't master to blurt out a sound that was meant to mirror the dark, post-industrial netherworld they felt they were living in (given they were based in run-down Hackney, the sound was apt): harsh, violent and robotic. On tracks like "Tesco Disco" and "Urge to Kill", the musical trio of Peter Christopherson, Cosey Fanni Tutti and Chris Carter propel the tracks forwards on vibrating customised synths and distorted guitar whilst singer Genesis P-Orridge barks out twisted, mean lyrics like some weird cross between Iggy Pop and Hitler. Other tracks are more ambient, lengthy swathes of electronic noise that bludgeon listeners into submission. It's perfectly nasty, or nastily perfect.
very (of sorts, I've always been fascinated by TG, just went through a period of preferring Cabaret Voltaire and Suicide) has come at an opportune moment, as late last year the band re-recorded their seminal debut as the The Thirty-Second Annual Report of Throbbing Gristle (Industrial Records; 2008). Not as immediate as its original, of course, but it is certainly more than a lazy re-hashing. The tracks are all drawn out and extended, with the added bonus of better sound quality than Mute / Grey Area's rather dull CD reissues of the band's back catalogue in the early nineties. As such, Carter's pulsating mechanics and Tutti's buzzing guitar are thrown into sharp relief. This is one to be played loud.
second album, the controversial (the cover pictures a young girl lying on a bed and exposing her knickers, whilst a photograph in the booklet shows the same girl sitting topless and grinning) D.o.A - The Third and Final Report (Industrial Records, 1978). It's a much more mixed bag than either their debut or 1979's Twenty Jazz Funk Greats (Industrial Records, 1979), with each member providing a solo track as well as the bundle of collaborations. The band was collapsing under the strain of their fractuous personal relationships, not helped by the demise of Tutti's relationship with P-Orridge and her affair with Carter. P-Orridge was becoming more paranoid, taking on most of the band's publicity and as such his lyrics, already sombre, became downright ferocious, taking in murder, mutilation, infanticide and the desperation of his newfound loneliness (particularly powerful on "Weeping", loved by Ian Curtis). Songs like "Hamburger Lady", "Hit By a Rock" and "Dead on Arrival" rank among the best the band ever recorded. Others, such as IBM or their 16-second reworking of their minor hit "United" are less interesting and so much filler. And filler is not a word I'm used to using with Throbbing Gristle. Even the less arresting tracks of The Second Annual Report (Industrial Records; 1977 - still their masterpiece) and 20 Jazz Funk Greats could never described as filler or dull.
Plunging into the history of Industrial music has allowed me to discover a whole wealth of bands beyond Throbbing Gristle. There's Cabaret Voltaire, of course, but I intend to do a wee post on them alone, as my big musical love of the year. Suffice to say no record collection is complete in my mind unless it includes Mix Up, Voice of America, Three Mantras and Red Mecca. But beyond the Sheffield trio, there are even more treasures. Take 23 Skidoo's all-too-brief debut Seven Songs (Fetish; 1982). The title's a lie - there are 8 songs, but they are all fast-paced and maximum only 5 minutes long, making this more an EP than an actual album. But it's still a classic. Taking TG's love for powerful and discordant electronics, but adding some funky percussion, 23 Skidoo took industrial into more commercial, but still powerful waters. In fact, at times Seven Songs is the most futuristic of the early industrial albums, echoing the early Human League with its synthetic bleeps and bloops and Kraftwerk with its robotic vocals. But fear not, on tracks like "Porno Base", its industrial credentials ring loud and clear, with dark electronics, mean vocals and a wry sample of famed "morality" campaigner Mary Whitehouse. It's certainly better than the similar Thirst (Fetish; 1981) by Clock DVA.
Altogether more sinister and sombre was Australian band SPK's Leichenschrei (Side Effects, 1982), one of the standout post-Gristle industrial releases. SPK were far darker and more contentious than 23 Skidoo, Clock DVA or even Cabaret Voltaire, with horrific posters and record covers that evoked the nastiest aspects of TG's oeuvre -and therefore human nature- even leaning in the direction of perennial shock masters Whitehouse. But the music on Leichenschrei remains perfect, comprised of brutal power electronics, harsh sounding rhythms and disturbing sound effects. This is music for downtrodden social outcasts, the insane and the lost, its icy atmospheres conjuring images of rain-swept streets in abandoned industrial zones, or run-down surgical clinics in some Miike-esque horror movie. Descriptions of autopsies, illnesses, testimonies by medical abuse victims or the insane (including the immortal line "The manager of the corporation tried to give me syphilis by wiping his cock on my sandwich") and crashing mechanical effects drift in and out of SPK's driving nightmare-scape, as unrelenting as Peter Brotzmann's "Machine Gun" and far more abrasive. For me, Leichenschrei is the true child of TG's Second Annual Report, one of only two records that approaches the masters' magnum opus for quality and force.
The other comparable record coincidentally also features a German title, but we have to zip across the Atlantic to get a taste of it, something actually near-impossible today as this album is pretty much lost now. The band were called Factrix, and are these days the stuff of legend, their influence and mystique far exceeding their sales. In such circumstances, the actual product can often prove to be overhyped and a let-down once finally listened to, but there is not such problem with Scheintot (Adolescent, 1981), which may just be one of the greatest "rock" albums ever made.
But Clock DVA and 23 Skidoo were showing the way when they incorporated metallic percusion into the harsh industrial soundscapes of their peers. Soon SPK and the likes of Test Dept. were doing the same and industrial music became more driving, more percussive, even dancey in places (this is the point that Cabaret Voltaire lose me...). Taking this to similar extremes as Throbbing Gristle and SPK did with electronics, German band Einsturzende Neubauten created one of the biggest splashes of the time, with their monumental debut Kollaps (ZickZack; 1981). It's one of my favourite albums of the eighties, and a true masterpiece of harsh, claustrophobic rock at its most extreme. Forgoing traditional "rock" instruments, Blixa Bargeld (a future occasional Bad Seed) and his madcap cohorts used nothing but power tools and sheets of metal to create the unhinged and violent musical backdrops for Bargeld's hoarse and raw primal scream vocals. This is most effective on the opener "Tanz Debil", a strangely groovy track but one that also disturbs and assaults with uninhibited angst; whilst "Steh auf Berlin" is more experimental, kicking off with the screech of a power drill! The title track is equally stunning, industrial blues like Free filtered through Killing Joke. If I'm truly honest, Kollaps gets a bit weaker towards the end, but the force of its first tracks and its general atmosphere of hysterical anger make it essential listening.
The last album that has been spinning away in my head is Lou Reed's Metal Machine Trio's The Creation of the Universe (Sister Ray; 2008). Available only through Reed's website, it's the recording of a live gig made in LA of this singualr new project that appears to have re-invigorated the former Velvet Underground singer. The Metal Machine Trio is comprised of Reed on guitar, Ulrich Krieger on sax and Sarth Calhoun on Fingerboard Continuum and live processing. Both Reed and Krieger also drone away on electronics. The album is comprised of two near-hour-long improvisations, that segue gracefully from minimalist drone to distorted noise to avant-gardist free jazz. It's a mesmerising concoction, unpredictable but engaging, the kind of hypnotic drone that sends me into raptures. It's a long and challenging listen, but I could not recommend it enough and it could just be the best album of the decade.
