Douglas Nine "Schmerzhaft" CD
[Legion Sudan]
Here we have seven untitled tracks of minimal harsh noise without a whole lot of layering at all. The distorted textures tend to rest in the midrange and often employ loops or repetitive crackling patterns with the occasional stuttered cutup or snippet of silence breaking things up a bit. The compositions range in length rather drastically from a mere minute to more than nine, and I'd be lying if I said that some of the lengthier pieces didn't tend to drag on compared to the more concise efforts. Occasionally samples are used, but I feel like the samples would be far more effective and add an interesting dimension to the tracks if they were actually integrated into the pieces rather than generally being pasted in before a track truly begins. But the real issue here is that, despite a tasteful running time of only 35 minutes total, this material lacks direction and generally all sounds almost exactly the same. Occasionally a cheesy cartoon sample will disrupt the atmosphere even more, but generally it's just hissy midrange distortion ad nauseum. I also rarely find recordings to be a problem when it comes to harsh noise, but in this case I think the lack of clarity and depth really hurts, especially because the tracks are so minimal and they really need to cover a wider tonal range to do some damage. All of these pieces are relatively flat and one-dimensional, so nothing really stands out or harnesses any true crunch power. Like other Legion Sudan releases the CD-R comes in a xeroxed sleeve that looks raw but works. But I'm not big on Hitler imagery at all. I can't tell what the purpose is here. The cover has Hitler sitting at a table surrounding by a bunch of idiots staring at him in awe like he's some sort of fuckin' god, and then as the sleeve unfolds there is another picture of Hitler doing the ol' "sieg heil". No thanks. What's up with that? The backside of the sleeve simply shows some collaged xerox artwork (almost entirely black) with the numbers 1 through 7 in place as a tracklist. I'm sorry to say it, but this is just a weak release overall. Get rid of the goofy cartoon samples, beef up the sound, add some variety, and experiment a bit more... then maybe you'll have something. But right now? No dice. (3/10)
Running time - 35:34, Tracks: 7
[Notable tracks: all are untitled]
Legion Sudan - http://www.angelfire.com/apes/legionsudan/

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