Compact reviews

My box of digitized goodies from the Small Doses distro sale I mentioned in my last post arrived today. Figured I'd post my thoughts as I make my way through the stack.

20.SV - Apocalyptic Desert - Digging this. Crossover noise release with rhythms, melody, and progressive composition. "Industrialized Post Apocalyptic Bio-Nuclear Radiative Frequencies Recorded In Tripoli - El Mina, Lebanon By Xardas." Comes in a slipcase featuring terrible Photoshopped artwork. Looks like a shitty promo, honestly. On Autumn Wind Productions. Oh, and I guess 15 minutes of this is all my shitty CD player will allow me, as it's started skipping.

EVP - Postmortem Canticles of Necromancy - This wants to be a 70s horror/thriller film score I think. But it's not creepy enough. Too much cheese for my tastes as well. Someone put a lot of work into this, but I can't get into it on first listen. Sharp DVD-style packaging. Also on AWP.

Alkerdeel - Luizig - Mostly slow "kvlt" black metal from Belgium (although not too kvlt to have a Myspace address printed on the sleeve, haha). Their site lists doom and psych influences as well as BM, and they do come through on the recording. This stuff is ok, not great. At War With False Noise re-release of an uber-limited cassette. Beautiful gray-on-black cardstock print job.

Behemothaur - Darkcrystal - Is it noise? Black metal? Free doom? Noise rock? All of the above, assembled in no particular order. Kiwi band featuring the CJA dude. Might take another listen to grow on me; I feel like the band is not sure exactly what effect they're going for, especially given the linear narrative of the accompanying booklet. Which is sharp as hell in the standard 200mg A4 style. Apparently an edition of 100. Neither release I've heard on this label has blown me away, but they get props for distinctive packaging.

Gargotheron - Black Metal Supreme - Another 200mg release. US black metal. Not into it. Fast/manic stuff featuring a drummer with some real chops but very rough around the edges. If this band is young, as I sense they are, they could go on to awesome things. But this doesn't do it for me. Edition of 100 in sharp packaging and a theme of being maimed in the desert by desert creatures or something.

Marzuraan - Five Years Worth of Fuck All - The Marzuraan LP is so good that I'm expecting great things from this collection. Things were going fine until my CD player got its panties in a bunch and started skipping double dutch. Anyway, this band is great. At War With False Noise put this out.

Not getting reviewed tonight: Ondo "Low" CD-r and Detritivore demo cassette. Tune in next time...