This release ties up some loose ends, collecting the studio material from a few elusive Current 93 releases: Looney Runes, Lucifer Over London, Tamlin and Misery Farm. It's a welcome release for those who didn't spring for these limited-edition EPs back when they were released, or for people who are just now getting up to speed with Current 93. What immediately sets SixSixSix: SickSickSick apart from other Current 93 compilations of previously existing material is the superior quality of the music.Durtro
Specifically, the songs from 1994's Lucifer Over London and Tamlin EPs, are among the best that Current 93 has produced. The epic song "Hitler as Kalki (SDM)" from Thunder Perfect Mind was the first time Tibet collaborated with Nick Salomon of The Bevis Frond, an oft-overlooked cult British brand responsible for psych-rock masterpieces like Triptych and New River Head. Nick Salomon's mindbending electric guitar soloing lent a heaviness and majesty to Tibet's crepuscular musings that is without equal in the Current 93 catalog. David Tibet's oft-expressed affection for 70's progressive and heavy metal acts like Uriah Heep and Judas Priest was finally given an outlet, to startlingly powerful effect.
On the title track of Lucifer Over London, Salomon again contributes psych guitar, this time aping the famous riff from Black Sabbath's "Paranoid," spinning it out into a hypnotic, cyclical refrain, as Tibet unfolds one of his more chilling visions of Apocalypse. The material on Lucifer and Tamlin, (along with the Of Ruine or Some Blazing Starre LP, which was recorded during these same sessions), seems to represent a pinnacle for Tibet's lyrics, effortlessly weaving deliriously rendered Gnostic symbolism with precise poetic imagery: "All tiny blue pain/As the Mother Blood emerges/Then the Mother Grief/And the Blue Gates of Death/Open armwide/Open teethwide." "Sad Go-Round" is a Groundhogs song from the album Solid, Tibet and Solomon using the achingly beautiful minor-chord guitar loop to accentuate the circular motion of the lyrics.
Tamlin's B-side "How the Great Satanic Glory Faded," also features a stunning performance by Salomon on guitar. Recorded over the phone line, Tiny Tim introduces the track by relating his vision of the devil as "a beautiful angel...telling the world's biggest lie," Tibet launches into a densely lyrical paean to the double-gendered form of Lucifer. "Tamlin" is a long-form traditional ballad from the British Isles, relating the story of a noblewoman impregnated by a wood sprite. The music is another gorgeous medieval setting by Michael Cashmore, and Tibet's menacing whisper is flanged and multiplied to chilling effect.
The material from 1990's Looney Runes has not held up terribly well, a collaboration with Steven Stapleton that results in a raucous industrial tune filled with perversely mutated nursery rhymes and wacky cartoon sound effects. "The Seven Bows Are Revealed At the End of Time..." is Tibet in prophet mode again, unveiling a hallucinogenic William Blake-style endtime scenario that wears thin after the first few listens. Finally, "Misery Farm" is pure novelty: a music hall sing-along with barnyard animal noises. It's quite amusing, but it feels strange coming at the end of so much deeply wrought poetry. 
Read More
