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VARIOUS ARTISTS "Like Music to their Ears vol.2"

Review by Aural Pressure (06.06.2004):

Neighbours away for the day. Check. Dog tied up in the garden. Check. Windows and doors closed. Check. Painkillers and glass of water at hand. Check. Cue the music:and hit: 'play'.

"Like music to their Ears Vol 2" is seventeen (17) tracks of varied extreme power electronic music from Mechanoise Labs, purveyors of all things loud and nasty, which is all you need to know about this CD. Hard-on giving or vomit inducing, the choice is up to your own personal taste. For the record my favourite tracks, in no particular order, were the following: Nagasaki Fondue - great original first track and winner of "funniest title for a tune" with 'Masturbated by a Cripple in a Wheelchair'. Control - because they never fail to impress. Rupor Udara - a blast from the past and a welcome addition to any serious noise collection. DVT - hardcore. Say no more. Cutman - nice strange squeals and vocals. Mourmansk 150 - suppressed aggression and vocals. This Is Not Red Paint - hypnotic and, compared to other acts on this compilation, fairly quiet. Wouldn't mind hearing more of their stuff. Pine Tree State Mind Control - ditto. NTT - love this guy more than my wife. Worthy of the purchase price of the CD alone. Angel of Decay - reminded me of MZ412 in places. A compliment. The rest of the acts, although not outstanding, still offered enough air turbulence to knock me off my chair. Which can't be a bad thing.

Overall then "Like Music to their Ears Vol 2" gets a big up from me and should be acquired by like minded souls.

ANM.

Review by Aversionline (06.2004):

Canada's Nagasaki Fondue opens this collection with a frantic cutup track of harsh noise, samples, and then some - a great, explosive intro and one of the finer pieces of lighthearted noise I've ever heard. Next up is a worthless power electronics track from The Mark Dutroux Slideshow (who I've rightfully never heard of). Worthless, I say, because the backing noise is pretty weak and the lyrics ("Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Cunt! Fuck!" and other such ridiculous rants) are a waste of fairly strong over the top Slogun-esque vocals.

Control follows with the masterful "Without Death": Five minutes of seething, sinister death industrial undercurrents with sizzling midrange distortion and highly distorted spoken vocals. This is what fucking power electronics is all about. Superb. Beton Barrage (France) is up next with some dense distorted throbs and some of the most obscured vocals I've come across (they blend in very closely against the harsh pulsating core). Australia's DVT follows with "[FFF]", a nice piece that relies mainly on raw death industrial backing sounds with a few secluded samples and some pitch-shifted vocal assaults deep in the heart of the mix.

Cutman (France) offers one of the most minimal tracks, based around a few loops and eventually breaking into some screaming vocals. I'm 50/50 on this one. I like some of the eerie noise a lot, but the piece is too one-sided, and the effects over the vocals render them almost powerless. Japanese veteran Government Alpha cranks out the loudest and most piercing track, "Scoop Out", which spans back and forth across thicker and rugged bass tones and crisp high-end stabs. I find it a little uninteresting, but it definitely makes its mark on this collection. Another French project, Mourmansk 150, drops a disappointing "power electronics" piece that sounds more like simplistic, rumbling harsh noise with really goofy vocals that sound sort of like filtered German barking or something.

Thankfully Foutredieu!!! follows with a decent harsh piece that, after opening with a sample, moves over into some twisted distortion and strange ambient textures that persist for about four minutes. There might be some vocals towards the end, but it's hard to be sure. Nagasaki Fondue's second contribution is entirely forgettable harsh noise, while yet another French outfit (This is Not Red Paint) brings in the first prominent sense of percussive rhythm in the brief "Inhale, Exhale and Die". Russia's Rupor Udara's track is similar in its use of rhythm, though more musically oriented on some level, with an abstract sense of melody (soft vocals that are almost sung and some weird synth lines to boot). Next is the ever-intriguing Pine Tree State Mind Control with "Nowhere": Subtly musical distorted bass notes, percussive industrial hits, a very persistent and borderline hypnotic structure, etc.

Sulphur (Australia) follows in a similar, though slightly cleaner and more ambient vein - complete with low-end drones and pulsing rhythms; and the oddly named Kryptogen Rundfunk (Russia) displays some minimal and foreboding dark ambience in the droning "Vision Reflections". By far the longest track is "Calipsia666" from Navicon Torture Technologies - opening with some whispered female vocals and shuffling musical elements (very distant). Distorted shouts gradually introduce themselves alongside a very faint hum of distortion while the carefully placed synths continue to develop in the background. Things simply fade to a close over the course of the final two minutes, and I have to say that this is one of the most impressive recordings to date from NTT. Angel of Decay (a solo project from Deathpile's Jonathan Canady) then closes the compilation with another excellent piece of dark ambient noise, with lots of absolutely immense low-end, subtle glitchy/distorted scratchings, and indecipherable vocal samples amidst some reverb and pitch-shifting.

The layout's alright, keeping things minimal with clean text and a few consistent photographs of industrial landscapes that are oddly vibrant in certain colors. Inside is contact information for each project, and that's about it. There are only a couple of tracks herein that I actively dislike, and I think this is a solid underground compilation that offers up both familiar and unfamiliar names. Good work, and absolutely worth checking out for the Control and Navicon Torture Technologies contributions alone!

Review by industrial.org (August 08, 2004):

This is a 17 track compilation CD with the tagline, "An International Gathering of Extreme Electronics." Nagasaki Fondue open the disc with a brief collage of samples and Harsh Noise blasts. The Mark Dutroux Slideshow is next with pulsing Power Electronics track that is somewhat suggestive of Bloodyminded in that he vocals are relatively unprocessed. Control unloads a plodding throb of complex and atmospheric PE on the track "...Without Death." Beton Barrage deliver an oversaturated freeform PE track with a pulsing core and unintelligible screams. DVT gives us some lo-fi heavy machine loops and grimy textures to surround the shouted vocals set within the mix. Cutman are next with their track "Alpha B, " an odd mix of sweeping atmosphere, moaning high frequency screeches with frenzied screams and distant groans toward the later part of the track that makes for a interesting piece. Government Alpha is next in the cue with a more controlled track than I was expecting, distorted tones, fluttering electronics and crushes of distortion and play off of each other for diverse and a corrosive attack. Mournmansk 150 deliver a constrictive PE barrage of sizzling textures and gruffly shouted vocals. Foutredieu!!! is next nice track of fluid heavy noise, and background atmospherics that really changes a lot over its duration. Nagasaki Fondue returns as the only project with two tracks here with a lo-fi feedback and white noise scared track. This Is Not Red Paint offer a rhythmic plod of distortion and statics with a tonal atmospheric base. Rupor Udara have to most structured track with a slow rhythmic piece that incorporates some November Novelet like tones with softly spoken vocals and an a distorted beat. Pine Tree State Mind Control bring together distorted factory loops and grating hi's with a slow synth melody. Sulphur's track is a mix of dirty atmospherics and slow machine like percussives. Kryptogen Rundfunk dispense drifting hi-freq electronic tones backed up by obscured and distant vocals for an overall \ minimalist feel. Navicon Torture Technologies have the longest track present, a slow building piece of subtle distortions and whispered female vocals, The sonics remain consistent but the female voice is replaces with distorted screams. Angel Of Decay finishes out the disc with subtlety shifting analog distortions, spoken vocals used more as texture and heavy atmospherics. This is a really well put together compilation, I had only heard about half of these projects before hand, but the label did a nice job of securing strong material from both the established and lesser know participants. Very nice.

Scott.

Review by Worm Gear Zine (09.07.2004):

Near the start of "Like Music To Their Ears 2" is a vocal snippet lamenting aloud as to who has to be slept with to get a gawdamned drink. Considering all the shrapnel flying I'd think a more appropriate snippet would be the "Jackass" quip "who's dick do I got to suck to get some explosions around here?" This release is not about the path to sedation in the slightest. Nope, abrasive and violently extroverted power electronics, noise and pure industrial.

The compilation maxes out the disc at 72+ minutes. There are 17 tracks total with a good mix of worn mug shots and newly entered delinquents. Mechanoise Labs describes the contents as "extreme electronics" which I am not going to argue with at all though this is not some machine-centric glitch fest. Instead the listener finds themself lost in a windy maze lined by personal demons hell bent on controlling both the intercom and all exits. Most tracks feature vocals of some form whether that be a bloody inner dialogue, hate filled rant or the indecipherable babbling of a manic depressive with their chemical balance dangerously tipped.

On the electronics front we are confronted with the lessons of the old school. . ."Dry Lungs" era alienation and social disassociation plus some ashen ghosts from the old country. Added to this curriculum is the breadth of special case tricks and chops that post Internet cross-pollination has allowed to prosper, meaning this release shows the kind of depth of knowledge and efficient execution that p2p based cultural education offers.

Pretty much the entirety here has at least some car accident like attraction so it is hard to pick out favourites but that said, a few do jab a little deeper. The Mark Dutroux Slideshow (whose name is totally lost on me) gives Atrax Morgue some props with their tastefully crass freakout. The chorus of "crime scene cunt" flies off the handle with a juicy drill cum delay line that has a Costes like nitrous taste that makes me laugh out loud - a little disturbing I must say considering the subject material). Control is also in fine, vitriolic form with their electrified grit pads rolling in like some poisonous red tide. Mourmanks 150 does their best impersonation of Bastard Noise covering the spin cycle of an improperly seated washing machine and I find the mix of machine minimalism with the gutteral vocals a compelling one. Foutredieu take a second to knock the autopan back into alignment but once the hand pulls back its nothing but white knuckles and skin crawl, like a sci-fi Veinke without any brakes. Kryptogen Rundfunk dips their fingers in a Vromb like womb which may be staid compared to the more exothermic outbursts here but does have enough subtlety to sneak in very, very close. The final thoughts go to Angel of Decay who shovels enough darkness into the gaping maw of a cavernous reverb setting that you almost develop nausea from the vertigo.

I enjoyed the first round of this series but volume 2 is in an entirely different class really. Brutal, heated and hypnotic with a wide range of the frequency spectrum abused and bleeding despite the tight thematic focus. A scab you definitely should pick at.

Moron.

Review by Vital Weekly (24.11.2004):

Noise on a sunny weather? Even when it's quite cold outside... I don't know if it makes a difference to you, but I'd better take a walk and leave the music for later... This is a compilation from the French label Mechanoise Labs and, as it says in the subtitle, it's 'an international gathering of extreme electronics'. These extreme electronics are often presented in a noise form, but it's not only about that. Some of the tracks, by Cutman (from France), Control (from USA) and others, are like a harsher noisy side of (post)industrial. Sometimes there's use of talking samples or the noise atmosphere is building up with voice shouting in Cutman's track, which adds more disturbance to it. What's common for all artists is a rather untamed approach and trashy use of noise in various contexts and ways, something Mechanoise Labs are obviously fond of. Lots of unknown names here, in fact I recognize only two, Government Alpha (Japan) and Mourmansk 150 (France). The others are: Nagasaki Fondue and Foutredieu!!! from Canada; from USA: The Mark Dutroux Slideshow, Pine Tree State Mind Control, Navicon Torture Technologies and Angel of Decay; France: bETON bARRAGE, This Is Not Red Paint; and also: DVT and Sulphur (from Australia), Rupor Udara and Kryptogen Rundfunk (Russia). 16 artists and 17 tracks.

BR.

Review in Russian: http://kr.radionoise.ru/rus/va_like_press.html