black metal / noise / industrial / hardcore

Over the years, the boundaries between genres have vanished more and more. Some think that is not good and try to remain pvre and trve to their roots, which should be tolerated. As long as nobody gets hurt for it. Others think that it’s good to cross boundaries and explore new genre-blending possibilities. With Mur from France it is clear from the very start – they belong to the latter group.

The six-piece combine so many styles and ideas, it is hard to twist your mind around all of them –
some parts are noise, some have an industrial touch, others bear witness to hardcore roots while all of them seem to be infused with a certain black metal attitude. So if you are looking for a band between Melvins, Pitchshifter, Venom and, let’s say, Portrayal of Guilt – here it is. Unfortunately, that sounds silly as all of the bands mentioned above do not have one single thing in common, and if you then try to get a mental impression of it, just by reading these lines – well, sorry, but your idea won’t do because Mur is more. Literally, they are more than just a combination of single ideas and styles.

Over the last couple of years we have seen a lot of developments in black metal but Mur is still a new one, because Black Metal and Industrial and Hardcore (the three main pillars) have not yet been amalgamated as cleverly as on “Brutalism”. Take “Third” as an example – it starts off with an eerie, soft combination of slightly distorted, electrified guitar picking and spherical ambient passages until a hardcore drum part kicks in and changes the tone completely.

Next is the blackened screaming by vocalist Jay and the song swirls and whirls around always
accompanied by synthesizers to give it some kind of gloom-factor. The rhythm section slows the
song down with industrial-like precision before it speeds up again and the shrieking noise parts
become stronger and then fade again when a nearly alternative metal part gives us a little clarity
with the synths now dominating again – the listener is thrown from side to side trying to grasp all
that is happening.

Clearly, one might argue that Mur are trying to do too much, trying too hard to get as many people in as possible. If you want to see it that way, you can, but maybe you are missing out on the fun of a record that shows some really good ideas and is still able to convince because of a lot of overall composition work in order to sound as if everything was in its right place. 


Thorsten

progressive rock / alternative / experimental

Ravage is an album released in September 8, the debut work of nooM, a French progressive and experimental rock project. Thirty-six minutes long, the record has seven tracks: 1) 12:34 AM; 2) Crescent; 3) Nuages; 4) Leave Me; 5) Parting; 6) When We Look At The Stars, We Whisper; 7) Where The Night Ends Us; with a serene and fugacious, almost melancholic musical splendor, the style displayed by this amazing artist is simple, but elegant, refined and masterfully cohesive. Delivering a sound agglutinated by a sensitive, but dispersive consistency, the dynamic vividness of the melodies are graciously perceptive, but also synchronically convergent. Its protuberant calmness dilacerates the introspective restlessness that subtly resides in the essence of its magnificent artistic splendor. 

The marvelous easiness of all the progressive elements are gracefully inserted into the music. The style displayed by the artist anticipates on the dynamism of its iridescent insurgencies the arduous glories of its sincere and vigorous creative possibilities. Despite its strong, homogeneous and exceptionally grounded style, the artist displays a colorful and intricate level of eclecticism and versatility. The fifth track, Parting — which in my opinion is the best — proves that perfectly. Featuring the exceptionally beautiful voice of singer Louise Dissous, the graceful vivacity of her voice certainly adds a tender element of exotic mystery to this song, that not only fits the melodies with gracious intensity, but also complements wonderfully the general guidelines of the rhythm. 

Although in a general evaluation the album can be considered very simple, Ravage is a cohesive and genuinely authorial work of art, whose creative strength is a musician that not only understands perfectly  how his most salutary qualities work, but also has the wisdom to use his technical excellence and creative virtues to conceive a sublime universe of dispersive majesty, where everything can be converted to a sonorous diagram of colorful proficiency, ostensibly crafting a dimension where musical sensibility and dynamic  pragmatism come together, to conceive restlessness as a new form of sentimental freedom.  

With gracefully renitent guitar lines that evokes the purity and calmness of a universe that has never seen light before, the music displayed in Ravage is exceptionally beautiful, and filled with a gracious imponence that is not only sincere, but also exponetially lucid and proverbial, though essentially somber in nature. Nevertheless, the style delivered by nooM is dense, dynamic and relentless, but paradoxically vivacious and splendid. Definitely, Ravage is a very intriguing, resonant, quite eventful album, a masterpiece whose  practical peculiarities redefine musical boundaries, within the diluted framework of a creative mind, that knows no limits or restricitions to its magnificent audacious nature. 


Wagner

post rock / experimental

Kesys is the debut album by an eponymous art rock project, led by French musician Jeff Grimal, released on August 30. A very concise effort — only half an hour long —, the record has six tracks: 1) Consolidated; 2) Kesys; 3) Sacré; 4) Il pleut sur notre amour; 5) Réception; 6) Soupir; with a calm and serene, but also very personal style, the sound present on Kesys is objective, though exceedingly masterful and consistent. The music delivers a powerfully dimensional symphony, that elevates the superb harmonies eagerly displayed in the work, to a level of sonorous density that is ambitiously creative and formidably proficient. Something that could be described as marginally simple, but also majestically relevant. Undoubtedly, the album delivers an unprecedented degree of virtues in the history of authorial art rock, although its degree of complexity is almost nonexistent, and its qualities are entirely grounded in the adjacent beauty inherent to the sensibility of the sound. 

The strength of the harmonies is certainly singular, and the degree of poetic beauty displayed in the musical lines are grounded in the graceful melodies that form the almost epic character of sound. With a creative proficiency as robust as its perceptive grandiosity, the intuitive talent behind this sensible musical masterpiece is exceptionally displayed in the dynamic features of the music; the sound reverberates like a fortress built up in the vast emptiness of a giant, everlasting and renitent darkness, like a dream that graciously resides upon itself. With a technical competence that appears to be as diligent as its creative inclinations, the general artistic horizon conceived by this work is splendidly elevated by the gentle, but somber grandiosity of the musician's inimitable serenity, as well as its impeccable level of diluted and straightforward sensitivity. 

With an almost perfect, but diluted serenity — whose harmonies defy the general layers of existence —, the sober musical lines crafted by musician Jeff Grimal certainly deserves wider appreciation. The exceptionally dispersive, almost melancholic melodies conceived by the artist creates an entirely new, deceptionally humane universe full of splendorous dissonances, whose energetic diagram full of restless uneasiness build an atmosphere of majestic vitality, where the soul can sleep and the conscience can rest, as long as the melodies move along with the universe crafted by the glory of its marvelous and elegant essence. 

A very magnificent debut, Kesys certainly has all the virtues to be a fantastic exponent of the alternative scene. With a tremendously singular style, that exhibits a proverbial greatness unseen in the contemporary scene, this project is a promise fulfilled, that has all the qualities at hand to keep evolving, and breaking musical boundaries, on its journey to create something entirely new, genuine, organic and vivaciously graceful.  


Wagner

post rock / experimental 

From Voodoo to Zen is an album released on September 20, by Polish post rock trio Tides From Nebula. Forty-five minutes long, the record has seven tracks: 1) Ghost Horses; 2) The New Delta; 3) Dopamine; 4) Radionoize; 5) From Voodoo to Zen; 6) Nothing to Fear and Nothing to Doubt; 7) Eve White, Eve Black, Jane; with a style that flirts with space rock and experimental elements, Tides From Nebula definitely displays a very peculiar and authorial musical style, whose vigorous harmonious dissonances embrace the overwhelming and overlooking orthodoxy of its own elegant and gracious authenticity, exhibiting a creative sensibility so beautifully engraved in the essence of the sound, that the soul inherent to the versatile anatomy of its glorious omniscience illuminates the most fundamental components of the melodies.

With colorful harmonies that envisions the poetic glory of a more diluted diagram of artistic ambitions, the music present in From Voodoo to Zen definitely displays severely distinct features, established in the horizon of its intrinsically dense, experimental and fugacious nature. Without any fear of being explicitly authorial, the proverbial dynamism displayed by the band reveals its sophisticated musical standards, that cannot be properly qualified into an ordinary category. With a groundbreaking sensibility — that conceives into a very introspective universe of serene vitality a musical atmosphere that seeks the splendor of an imponderable convergence of virtues —, Tides From Nebula reveals itself as a remarkable and intricate, though sober and discreet, creative possibility, able to align in a new technical configuration the absolute magnificence of sound, to be felt as a restless everlasting dream, whose natural result is its own vivacious significance.   

Probably being vastly different from everything that you have heard, From Voodoo to Zen is an exceptional album, because its audacious creative nature doesn't aspire to any ambitions, other than the music itself; the fluidity of its serene and diluted cosmogony reivents not only the essence of its dispersive artistic sensibility, but revolves around the epicenter of its uniqueness. With a sensational degree of originality, that doesn't fear the greatness of its graciously distinctive and tenacious restlessness, Tides From Nebula has conceived this work as a glorious and diligent masterpiece, that has enough virtues to be a landmark in the history of the genre. 

With a futuristic sound that celebrates the band's uniqueness, the graceful horizon of consistent majesty that can be appreciated throughout the record has no boundaries defined. Displaying formidable levels of consistency and authenticity, From Voodoo to Zen is an exceedingly proverbial experimental rock album, whose sophisticated authorial lines are surpassed only by the splendid beauty of the harmonies. Definitely, this album not only deserves to make history, but it will be a terrible heresy not to sell millions of copies. The fantastic convergence of creative proficiency and poetic deliverance displayed on this record has yet to be achieved. More than just an album, From Voodoo to Zen is a singular milestone in the continuos development of post rock in the contemporary scene.


Wagner

ambient / experimental / drone

Rapoon returned once more to the Winter-Light label with the last part of the Mercury Rising Trilogy, Sol Laude: Mercury Rising 3. Robin Storey’s new feel, that of a more off world spacious ambiance, was extended in the album Sol Laude without losing its own identity. The out of the box approach of this electronic music recording grasped us immediately by the throat. 

A dark claustrophobic soundscape emerged from the first tunes through the headphones (yes, this is headphone music). Vast structures of blackened cavities filled with sounds of unknown cosmic origins  create a filmic science-fiction world. Mysterious sounds and voice-like effects convey tranquility with relieving fairy tale bliss. The ethno and jazzy modus operandi combined with neoclassical sound structures left us with a new interstellar and sensational feeling. 

The trilogy began in November 2017 with Sanctus Equinox, which was then followed by Offworld OP1 Equs (http://www.merchantsofair.com/albums/rapoon-offworld-op1-equs). On Sol Laude the thoughts and visions of Robin Storey are transferred into musical experiments which sting the brain cells like soft needles, stimulating a mind melt with the music and moves the listener to strange off worlds. The impressions transferred by this recording are overwhelming. The most impressive part is A New Sun, a twenty minutes long track with echoing industrial drones and piano parts that conceive emotions of sadness and emptiness colored with subtle neoclassical melodies. 

Rapoon is a living spaceship traveling like a comet into deep space and collecting fragments of precious and drifting remnants of the past and the future. This third part of the Mercury Rising Trilogy is a wonderful and stimulating trip filled with electronic soundscapes, classical arrangements and majestic choral bursts. Rapoon’s creations contain the afflatus of a genius. Sol Laude is an exceeding piece of exploring electronic music and makes the Mercury Rising triptych a unique and mind blowing work. We already know what we want for X-mas…

​
Patsker

post rock / experimental

Paralax Markovian Denigrate is an album released on July 10 by a Polish musician, under the alias of DeLaa Fargis. A very concise work, the record is only thirty-five minutes long, and has seven tracks: 1) Falling of...; 2) Confusion - The Manner; 3) Singularity Quantized; 4) Outdazzled; 5) Megachile Pluto; 6) Nonenzymic Paradox; 7) Deoxidized; with exceedingly beautiful melodies, and an expressively serene and poetic musical layout, the sensibility present on this work reveals an aggrandizing and quintessential level of artistry, whose refined, dense and proverbial degree of originality could not have generated another result, other than the magnificient state of the art work that Paralax Markovian Denigrate came out to be. 

With cohesive, but incredibly dilated harmonies — that expand in the direction of its passionate, but rational sensibilities —, this album is a remarkable conjuncture of musical virtues, that perfectly align together to obtain a functional and dynamic convergence of values, able to conceive astounding, colossal and pure symphonies in the process. Invariably, its glorious qualities surpass the boundaries of its own creative and splendid authorial universes, in all possible layers of sound. 

Displaying calmer melodies that navigates in the infinite ocean of a restless and everlasting dream, the music of DeLaa Fargis rises from a graceful combination between sensibility and tenacity. With some gracious and impeccable piano passages that definitely discloses a personal universe of introspective tenderness, its overall musical possibilities expand to a vast and intricate sonorous resurgence of domineering placidity, whose deliverance projects towards the structure of the melodies a salutary symbiosis of sentiments, that progressively escalates to a monumental and splendorous creative palace of miraculous and reinvigorating glory, that exhibits on the arduous melancholy of its notes all the majesty of its renitent, but bright originality.   

With an interesting sonority that displays a formidable degree of authenticity, Paralax Markovian Denigrate — by DeLaa Fargis —, is an absolutely spectacular and genuine work of art, that deserves to be highly appreciated. With an amazingly peculiar, profound and audacious musicality, this fantastic artist has all the necessary qualities to prosper in a fabulous career, with enough talent to propitiate to the increasingly ordinary underground scene the development of more lucid, sober and innovative standards. 



Wagner

experimental / avant garde

I like strong female voices. Examples are the ritual chanting of Jarboe, the soulful crooning of Amy Winehouse, or the screaming of Amelie Bruun (Myrkur). Hell, even Adele would be great if it weren't for those mostly cheesy songs.

Last year I added Kristin Hayter of Lingua Ignota to this list. I was genuinely shocked when I first heard "All bitches Die", because of her intense, chilling screams - barely human, and especially not "female" at all. Music is rarely really frightening, but this really shook me to the bone.



So I was really eager to pick up the follow up record, Caligula. From the song titles alone you can already tell this are not really love songs: Butcher Of The World, If The Poison Won't Take You My Dogs Will, Fucking Deathdealer, and so on.

On this record Kristen has been assisted by some high profile musicians (Full of Hell, Uniform et al.). So musically it's a much more diverse affair, with the piano playing an important role. I have
to say this suits her (classically trained) vocals well, although I feel screaming is really her "unique selling point". She does some interesting throat singing as well this time (Fragrant Is My Many Flower'd Crown and Sorrow! Sorrow! Sorrow!), and at times even sounds a lot like Tori Amos ( May Failure Be Your Noose).

The violent and larger-than-life lyrics are an important part of what makes her so interesting, and, as before, they are based on her violent past (she was a victim of sexual abuse in her past). If I had to compare this record to her previous, I would say this is a more therapeutic record. "All bitches die" is rawer, it is the sound of a psychotic girl running around the street screaming, and harassing random passers-by. "Caligula", on the other hand, is Kristen lying on the couch of a shrink, recalling traumatic events from her past. Somehow it sounds more controlled and "safer" than before.

"Caligula" is a very good record, that will surely appeal to the hipster crowd. It's certainly more accessible than her previous record. Personally I would have liked a bit more screaming and a bit
less piano. Then again, this is probably a logical evolution, which should give her a lot more exposure to adventurous music lovers.


​Koen

post rock / experimental / alternative

Kota — released in July 2 —, is the debut album of Kota Kota, the personal musical project of English musician Michael Holmes. Sixty-two minutes long, the album has nine tracks: 1)Black Waltz; 2)Lyric; 3)Extend Your Fingers; 4)The End; 5)Burleywood; 6)Transitions; 7)Until The Last Minute You Breathe; 8)Crimea River; 9)L'appel du Vide; with generally long tracks, and exceedingly marvelous and poetic harmonies, this album is filled with  a wonderfully crafted and formidably genuine creativity, that definitely elevates post rock to a whole new level of sagacious originality and splendorous sensibility, unprecedented since the conception of the genre. 

With dynamic melodies, and a very vivacious musical synergy, the sonorous atmosphere conceived in this majestic album circulates within the axis of its own graciosity. Displaying a serene, but conscious acquiescence that delightfully departs from the bright disposition of its fantastic and pristine tenderness, the sound created by the artist delivers directly to the soul the omnipotence of an everlasting beauty, whose poetic resurgence dissipates the eagerness of its volatile and captivating temperance.  

As the sound achieves the glory of the restless melancholy of its dispersive essence, the rhythm gets more and more pervasive, with all of its pungent density proclaiming in the vastness of its consistence the diligence of harmonies that will never fade away. 

With a clear and distinct sound that gradually departs from the latent darkness of its diluted consciousness, the style of the artist is simple, but delightfully graceful and beautiful, as the sound delivers a melancholic stupor that intrinsically reinvigorates the life present on its simple virtues. With its tempestuous dissonances gradually increasing, the rules of harmonies reborn in a more colorful landscape full of ghosts and shadows; otherwise, the melodies — indebted to a fascinating cosmogony that discreetly compensates in the peripheries of its glory a vast conjuncture of progressive elements and lethargic ordeals — rearrange in more graceful patterns the extraordinary creative devices that comprises the fascinating musical universe of Michael Holmes. 

With a smooth, expansive, unexpected and salutary degree of experimentalism, that delivers to the audience a musical sensibility engraved in an audacious virtuosity, the sound present in Kota is a marvelous exposition of authenticity, crafted by an expressively talented musician, that has all the necessary qualities to create an entirely new genre by himself, departing from the unlimited excellence of his own peculiar and formidable sense of incomparable originality.  


Wagner

experimental / electronic

Zona Watusa

The Bristol based and creative mind Nick Edwards, has been in public view since 2010. He already released a huge amount of music on Punch Drunk, Further Records and on the legendary British electronica label Planet Mu. Ekoplekz never plans albums from the start. He creates, records, lives  with it for a while and later on selects the best tracks to become a release.

Metabolizm is his first production for the Barcelona based Zona Watusa label. Seven tracks of lo-fi and experimental electronic pulses create a bleeping science fiction world. The compositions are filled with many layers of sonic escapades which create a numb and dreamy feeling. A wide pallet of organic pulses takes the listener to a world with no stories. The sounds are so profound, assembling a impenetrable dome in the brain. Ekoplekz  does not allow room for thoughts in his complex sonic world.

The variety in sequences of steps with contradictory rhythms and dub beats gives this music a very interesting and unique underground range. We could hear slices of the Higher Intelligence Agency influences on this recording. Ekopleks seven musical concepts on Metabolizm travel from ambient to dub, minimal techno to downbeat electronica. The sonic structures are coloured with beautiful and experimental sound arrangements.

The limited tape edition was quickly sold out but this wonderful  and fascinating recording is available for download at  a very fair price. Ekopleks shows that his adventures in sound can lift the senses and conceive new worlds with a swaying retro style.

​
Patsker

noise / dark ambient / experimental

bandcamp

electronic

dSound In Silence

progressive / metal / black metal

heavy metal / thrash metal

downtempo / electronic / post rock / shoegaze

facebook

psychedelic / doom

sludge / black metal

ambient / modern classical / experimental

bandcamp

drone / doom / noise / experimental

ambient / electronic

noise rock

stoner rock / grunge / alternative rock

facebook

​Serge