Bastard Noise/Christian Renou "Brainstorming" CD
[Desolation House]
This is an interesting collaborative effort between the infamous Bastard Noise (here with the Wiese/Wood lineup) and French experimental artist Christian Renou, making for a diverse mix of over an hour's worth of analog and digital material. The massive 20-minute "Upgrade to Extinction" starts out with some clicking sounds and vibrating hums with absolutely insane, sick vocal shrieks... totally over the top. After the vocals subside things get a bit more abrasive with some caustic distorted hums and hisses with fluttering chunks of electronic noise. Later on there are some ambient soundscapes involved, as is some muddier distortion that isn't as hard on the ears... but there's also some rhythmic throbbing and piercing high-pitched ringing that can be quite painful. Such a back and forth sort of tug of war between the cleaner, brighter ambient side and the rugged, chaotic noisy side continues throughout this entire disc, and it's done rather well. "Sodium Annethal" uses some backwards samples and lots of thick, pulsating tones with a little bit of a musical vibe (in that you can discern actual musical notes), but everything is overloaded and fucked with so much that it's a really strange sort of feeling... very cool though. And the shorter running time comes at a nice juncture in the disc, making the song pop out a bit. "Solaris" is probably the calmest and most minimal piece on the entire CD, also running a bit shorter (just under seven minutes), but they close out with another whopper, complete with vocals, in "Remains of Paradise". Things may start out quietly with some percussive tones and a bit of delay and small spurts of quick feedback, but then, out of nowhere, come the patented throat shredding vocal shouts/growls for which Bastard Noise is known (later morphing into shrieking and deep, deep "talking"), as low bass hums start to pick up and the percussive sounds get more rigid and persistent. It never gets too loud or aggressive, but it certainly gets more confrontational. I don't have any complaints with the recording either. It's not too pristine, but it's not rugged... everything is fairly clear but tightly mixed and cohesive. Good stuff. The CD comes in a nice digipack that focuses mostly on red, white, and black. The front cover is mostly white with a small image of a burnt baby doll head (looking oddly like charred flesh), the back cover is mostly black with some red and white text, and then a large chunk of text (lyrics) printed in a gloss overlay, and inside are some bright red and black panels of artwork - two showing some sketches that I can't quite make out, and one brandishing the unforgettable Bastard Noise skull icon. The lyrics (what few there are) are awesome, however: "Regressive species convinced that they are 'the shit', Toilet beings - toxic at birth, Filtering wellness out, Creating superior strains of disease by pharmaceutical repression, For this world, modern man has dealt a 'death blow', humans squirting out of vaginal crypts in infinite numbers, Stupid fucking homosapiens, Upgrade all human life to extinction..." This is a great collaboration, a true collaboration. One of the best I've heard in quite some time, actually. This is definitely worth checking out. (7/10)
Running time - 66:52, Tracks: 6
[Notable tracks: Upgrade to Extinction, Sodium Annethal, Remains of Paradise]
Desolation House - http://www.desolationhouse.com

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