The title of this Australian artist’s latest album is extremely fitting.  Passages of roughly edited tape, collages of indecipherable found sounds, and bizarre production is disorienting at best, and downright baffling much of the time.  It is because of this confusing, jarring, and sometimes frightening nature that the disc works so well.
500m beautifully combines Gudrun Gut’s programmed percussion and editing discipline with Jochen Irmler’s meandering organ playing and natural spontaneity.
As a split release with each artist submitting three pieces, the pairing is perfect.  The two projects share similar aesthetics and aptitude in their own take on modern industrial music.  Even though their individual work is clearly distinct from each other, the two fit together very well into a cohesive whole.
As one of the major triumvirate of Italian power electronics (alongside Atrax Morgue/Marco Corbelli and Mauthausen Orchestra/Pierpaolo Zoppo), Moreno Daldosso has not released any new material in over a decade, and Der Totenkopf may be his final recording. With his two peers no longer with us, this record serves as an epitaph for this distinct group of artists, and it fits right in amongst the best of those albums.
Much to my delight, Medical Records has recently reissued two of the arguable jewels of the Severed Heads' discography: 1983's Since the Accident and this effort from 1985.  Both hail from the transitional period between the messy, contrarian experimentalism of the band's early years and Tom Ellard's later forays into more conventional electronic pop.  While City Slab Horror lacks anything like a hit single (Accident had "Dead Eyes Opened"), it is actually the more listenable of the two releases, finding a fine balance between Ellard's more perverse and absurdist tendencies and actual beats and hooks.  Naturally, the primitive technology employed sounds rather dated thirty years later, but Ellard's distinctive eccentricity remains as charming as ever.
I hate to use the phrase "return to form" to describe this album, as I have enjoyed most of Lawrence English's divergent recent efforts quite a bit, but Wilderness of Mirrors reminds me favorably of the darker, heavier albums that brought him to my attention in the first place (such as Kiri No Oto and It's Up To Us To Live).  Characteristically, English also offers an intriguing concept on Wilderness, but the primary appeal is simply that it is wonderful to finally get another substantial offering of what he does best.  That said, this effort does offer a few surprises, as Lawrence has picked up a few neat tricks from folks like My Bloody Valentine and Swans since he last surfaced in heavy drone mode.
There may be some throwback elements on Ars Phoenix's most recent album, but for the most part it makes for great contemporary synth pop. Retaining a darker, and occasionally harsh, edge, the eight songs that comprise it work beyond just their mood, but as memorable, well-written songs as well.
Elden M.'s electro-industrial Avellan Cross project was not only responsible for a few excellent tapes as of late, but also heralded the return of his legendary Allegory Chapel Ltd. guise. Founded in the mid 1980s and largely going silent a decade later, ACL has lost none of its distinctive, esoteric sound or mood during that hiatus, and still stands out as a singular entity in the world of noise.
Five years ago, this San Francisco DJ/producer released quite a massive, remarkable, and distinctive ambient epic called White Clouds Drift On and On, his first album under his own name.  Home is its follow-up and I have no idea quite what to make of it.  In some ways, it surpasses its wonderful predecessor in its lush, melancholy grandeur.  In other ways, however, its extreme length (almost 3 hours) coupled with its narrow, unwavering aesthetic serve to exaggerate its charms to the point of caricature or folly.  There are still some wonderful songs here, of course, but too much of a good thing yields rapidly diminishing returns.
In some ways, Gog’s new LP comes across as a rebirth of the project that keeps the best elements of Michael Bjella's work while pushing boundaries and expectations. The bleak, moody guitar noise is still there, culled from the best bits of metal and drone, but Gog manages to go further and make music that is challenging, but still memorable as songs, rather than just compositions.
