The second release from the happy clappy couple is a 24-minute-long piece broken into four parts, constructed around a bleak and grating improvised dual-guitar drone recorded while the duo was still constructing ‘The Unnamable’. This time around, Dave Brenner provides vocals, guitar, bass, synths/keys, and effects with Lane Oliver on vocals, guitar, synth, effects. It was mastered by Dan Emery, who I normally come across when he is working on bluegrass and country, and this is definitely nothing like that!
It does feel strange to have spoken vocals (although at the same layer as the music, not in front of) while there is bedlam and chaos taking place, and it makes me think of the band on the Titanic still playing as it went down, as if we are watching musicians attempting to provide some normality while the building is being attacked by monsters just before it is blown away by the blast from an atomic explosion. It is bleak, painful, yet with a strange beauty deep inside which struggles to be heard under the layers of despair, a small patch of colour, like a flower struggling to break through the grey aftermath of a destroyed industrial landscape. This feels more akin to Gridfailure’s releases, although with a much higher emphasis on the use of guitar and less on keyboards and effects, yet when we get towards the end of “Part II” it appears to be reaching to a crescendo but we fall over the peak into a different, less jagged world and we continue to wonder what is going on?
If, like me, you have enjoyed the sonic adventures of Brenner over the years then this combined project with Oliver is definitely worth investigating. It is adding more shades of bleakness and lack of hope to a project which is already pretty out there, and for the musically adventurous this is a journey worth taking.
Rating: 8/10
Links:
https://www.facebook.com/diminishingnoise
https://anticorpmusic.com/