Tips Zum Selbstmord

A random Bandcamp find - solo black metal project out of Greece. This album is an absolute ripper - "blackened doom" is mostly shit but this one's a bit of a flip. Call it doomy black metal. Ala depressive USBM - Weakling, Leviathan, Jabladav et al. The production is fuzz n' buzz, the riffs are thick, and the vocals, wowee. Sounds like something recorded thru the steel doors of an insane asylum. Four tracks, the first one is a 20 minute goliath and worth the price of admission alone. Just a beauty all around.

Another one I wasn't expecting much from but Finders Keepers always gets a fair shake, this turned out to be surprisingly legit. Influenced by Philip Glass and Tangerine Dream in the 70's, "Ami embarked on an experiment with what he coined Alpha Mood – a state in which the brain is working in relaxation and in which he used music as a means of helping induce his own meditative state". These aren't the droney, spacey, meditative synth pieces you'd expect - they're hypnotic in an active sense, very stimulating and dynamic. Seems not much is left of Shavit's recorded legacy but I'm glad I gave these a shot, very neat.

I dithered for a bit on checking this out - figured I'd just check out the actual tapes this comp is sourced from at some point. But it just kept popping up in places I trust enough that I decided to check it out. Glad I did! Real cool selection from three tapes made in the abovementioned years by this husband/wife project, native to other weird French avant/prog groups. The first few tracks are firmly in the Tangerine Dream/Schulze/Schnitzler arena but things get a little far out and funky in the middle. The last four are edits, presumably of longer pieces. I'll have to investigate the original tapes after all (OK rips of the tapes...). Good listening.

I quite liked "Black Ben Carson", and "The Second Amendment" with Freaky. I always have time for JPEGMAFIA. On first listen, as is usually the case with him, it could use a tighter edit. There's a lot of ideas whizzing around on here from song to song. The whole album feels that way, songs often end abruptly as if "Peggy" is switching ideas live. There's a few really good tracks on here - "Baby I'm Bleeding" and "Rainbow Six" (feat. Yung Midpack) in particular stuck out. As a whole it's not terribly cohesive and I'll have to give it a few more listens to see if it sticks.

I pick Mark McGuire (and Emeralds) releases almost at random to check out, this one came up so I gave it a listen - it was OK, nothing that stuck with me or set it apart from the more undistinguished Mark McGuire releases.

I stumbled upon this one on Bandcamp. I don't usually fuck with unknown ambient/field recording stuff because most of it is so samey and uninteresting. Prefer someone to vet them for me first. But the descripto - "Recorded during a scientific research cruise on board the RV Prince Madog near South Stack, North Wales in January 2017. Each track is based around a field recording made on the ship, the constant drone you hear is the engine" - how can you not? Unfortunately the album is a bust, nice enough but uninteresting and not memorable. The reason I dodge most of these. Oh well.

Not much of a dark ambient fan, most of the time I outright dislike it. Boring, samey shit. This one's different and I like it. I've heard some Atrium Carceri stuff in the past but not the others. This is a cool imaginary soundtrack billed as "dark jazz" - there's drumming and percussion that immediately separates it from electronic dark ambient slop. Courtesy God Body Disconnect I am told (kool name). If Twin Peaks was set in the industrial district, this would be playing. Real good.

One slow droning piece recorded live in December 2017. Didn't do much for me, pretty forgettable.

Pretty cool comp from Finders Keepers, certainly sounds like what it says (and looks like) on the tin - groovy b-music from horror/exploitation flicks. It's hard to get too into these kinds of comps as they're pretty scattershot and more for almost historical interest more than anything but it was a fun listen.

I always try to make time for Mater Suspiria Vision even if witch house is not so hip these days. This album ain't too hip either, a mostly beat-less and kind of lazy sounding effort. Some kool vocals by Rachel Audrey on some tracks. "An album recorded in spanish ghost caves while filming Phantasmagoria 2. Parts of the album were used in Cosmotropia de Xam's Horror Exploitation Vampire Witch movie "Phantasmagoria 2"."

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