So, by that reasoning, the fact that you are reading this means that this is going to be a nice review, right? Well, yeah, you're right! However, that would be the case, regardless of who was behind Misantronics. In fact, Serge doesn't even know I'm doing this review. Well he does now, since he puts these online of course.
Misantronics has been going quite steadily for some 8 odd years now, releasing what he damn well pleases in both digital and physical form. I came into contact with the release 'Mi Nahi' when his wife, who happens to be my colleague, approached me with that cd release a couple of years ago. She knew of my love for noise, ambient, industrial and drones. She also knew how much I love the early days of the Cold Meat Industry label and my days as a dweller of underground industrial parties. And Misantronics is practically an embodiment of all those things. It hearkens back to the good old days of those quality CMI releases. and 'Contraformance' is no different. Part field recording, part live performance, part soundscape using earlier pieces, these two half-our tracks present some of the strongest of Misantronics to date. They are droning, rhythmic, industrial, ambient monsters that recall the likes of In Slaughter Natives, Morthond, Raison d'Etre, Mortiis, Sanctum.. All the great acts from the glory days of Cold Meat Industry. I was instantly transported back to those mid- to late 1990's. Washes of blissed-out ambience are underlined by distant tribal drums and fragments of field recordings, grinding static, deep drones, curious samples (I'm pretty sure I'm hearing the MOA mascotte Lina the Cat somewhere) and gloomy industrial rhythms. It is the soundtrack to bad dreams but at the same time you don't want those dreams to end.
I'm playing this now, as I write, at the end of a hard day of labour in my garden. Immersed in total darkness. A glass of wine close by, as well as my cat Knäuli and one of my french bulldogs, Jef. And I cannot imagine a better ending of my day... If you, like me, often long for those days when you knew that every release CMI did, you need this.
Now, if only I would be payed doing MOA, now would be the time I could ask Serge for a raise...
Bjorn