Faithless - Reverence

I can't tell you how rare it is that I come across the perfect album, and I mean that in the sense of when on a record every single song is flawless; each piece contributing not only to the overall experience, but able to stand its own ground without just being needless filler. Faithless are not a band that I spin all that often anymore, but if I'm in the mood for this style of music, then I can accept no substitute. 

Faithless is a bizarre multi-genre affair mixing the work of the DJ Sister Bliss, producer Rollo (who is Dido's brother) and MC Maxi Jazz. What we get, on Reverence at least, is a strange hybrid of dance, pop and indie. On later records the band's style would become more sparse and less dance-orientated, but Reverence is 90s Britain to the absolute max. The opening title track mixes lazy, smooth hip hop with throbbing techno, whilst "Salva Mea" is a trip in lush, lucid house; "If Lovin' You Is Wrong" is a raunchy, jazzy, almost theatrical pop explosion, and "Dirty Old Man" plays on the tropes of dub reggae in the most subtle way. 

On top of those you've got "Flowerstand Man" with Dido on the lead vocals, the life-lesson of "Baseball Cap" and the now legendary "Insomnia", which catapulted Faithless to the top of the charts upon its release. The fact that "Insomnia" - probably one of the most memorable dance tunes of all time - is such a small part of this album really speaks volumes to the strength of the songwriting on display here. This nearly 9-minute epic is on the same record with ballads such as "Don't Leave" and "Angeline", which should be jarring and fractured, but somehow it all just flows perfectly. The audacity of it all, eh? 

Irregardless of where Faithless went with their sound after this record, I am genuinely strugglingly to think of a stronger debut album from any artist, in any genre.

Necro Deathmort - Martian Cartography

Martian Cartography is an excellent album release by the criminally under-rated experimental duo Necro Deathmort. Mixing catastrophically heavy atmosphere with intelligent, progressive electronic work has always been ND's forte, but on Martian Cartography, I find that this approach to sound design has finally had chance to spread its wings and fly. In some respects that means that this record isn't as hard-hitting or droning as something off Music Of Bleak Origin or earlier, but the duo more than make up for it on the journey that they help take us on.

The opening track "Repeat-O" - and also, I'm sure not coincidentally, my favourite track, "The Ultimate Testament (Remix)" - both have pulsating beats carrying them; a clinical industrial backbone to a sparse electronic worldview. Other stand outs for me include "Cold Sleeps" and the muted closer, "Terra Cimmeria", which has a relaxed, almost deep house feel. 

Originally released as a download by the band themselves, this was eventually pressed onto CD by Extreme Ultimate.

Blank Banshee - Blank Banshee 0

I might be a bit late to the Blank Banshee party, but that doesn't stop me from chaining the entire discography a few times on a night shift or two. It definitely got the ol' chair reclining; it was actually quite pleasant working away to the busy-yet-lucid tunes in a 2am caffeine haze. What stood out to me the most out of the Blank Banshee records was this one, the first one.

There's just something about this one that seems much more precious. It is hard to be original at all in electronic music, and whilst I'm not claiming that Blank Banshee has in any way re-invented the wheel, this is an extremely refreshing take on several different layers of the electronic world. I know I'm playing catch up, but this is amazing stuff. 

Clams Casino - Rainforest

Rainforest by Clams Casino is probably my top contender for favourite driving music at the moment, especially during the night time. Rainforest is as dense and multi-layered as its moniker suggests; overlapping, almost distorted layers of electronic auras mingle freely over retro drum programming and ethereal vocal tomfoolery. Honestly, the whole thing is a bit disjoined but each individual track works so well in unfolding its own world that you don’t want it to end.

Opener “Natural” sounds to me like Jesu meets King Tubby, whilst the excellent “Treetops” that follows it is more akin to a jam between Emeralds and Burial. I could go on in this vein for quite some time, but it feels like I’m not giving Clams Casino any credit for the sounds on offer here. It’s really interesting because Mr. Clams is a hip hop producer. You don’t really see that many hip hop producers releasing solo stuff like this (if anyone says Dr. Dre I’ll fucking clock you haha) and asides from the Instrumentals series he’s released over the years, it appears Rainforest is Clams Casino’s only stand-alone original material. I could be wrong on this shout though – if I am, hit me up with more of this stuff, it’s simply gorgeous.

Alec Empire Vs. Merzbow - Live CBGB's NYC 1998

Christ, who's idea was this? Mixing gabba-techno / industrial kingpin Alec Empire with the father of harsh noise, Akita Masami would surely result in a cacophonous cocktail that would make the world end in any other given circumstance. Somehow the earth didn't stop turning, and instead we are treated to one of the craziest collaborations in musical history in all it's glory. This is quite probably the most coherent thing I've heard Merzbow being involved in. Empire's spastic beat programming and bass warbles dominate the forefront of the performance, with Merzbow's harsh noise attacks bringing up the rear, fleshing out the higher echelons of the audio canvas. 

It's kinda like what Libido Airbag would sound like if their members were originally from Ramleh instead of GUT. I've not heard awkward synths and industrial terror mashed together so uncertainly since Greed-era Swans. Obviously, the 'harshness' of the harsh noise has to be a little scaled back for Empire's parts to even get a look in, but even when it's Merzbow's time to shine, he seems to focus on broken, stuttering loops and staccato, stabbing distortion in lieu of punishing walls of wailing static. There are some clever references in the song titles here, such as "606: The Number Of The Beast" and "Curse Of The Golden Angel". In case you didn't know, this references Curse Of The Golden Vampire, which was another short-lived bat-shit-crazy-random supergroup featuring Alec Empire, Godflesh's Justin Broadrick and Kevin Martin of The Bug / King Midas Sound fame (I know, right?).

Whoever thought up this collab might have possibly been smoking a lot of meth at the time, but it fucking works. If you loved Masami's Merzbeat, Aqua Necromancer or Door Opens At 8am albums, or even his Merzdub collaboration with Jamie Saft, then you've probably already heard this. If you're an Alec Empire fan, I don't see why you wouldn't love this either. Everyone is a winner! 

Data Shit - Reconstruction Deformation

Now this is really nice - imagine combining the sounds of gabba techno drum programming (but slowed down a touch) with the random ambience of early Warp Records electronic music like The Aphex Twin. It's kinda like a drum'n'bassy Venetian Snares making sweet, sweet love to Optimus Prime, at varying BPM.

"Time Is A Disease" is a beast of an opener, with moody synths and epic piano lines, before it bursts this EP open with a flurry of garbled electronica and blasting 909 beats. "At Least We Have McDonalds" is a scatterfuck of a track, incorporating elements of dubstep into an already chaotic sound. "The Ghost Of My Girlfriend's House" is as close to straight-up Snares worship Data Shit can get, before closer "Hypertrophy" is a simmering mirage of operatic samples and grindcore-grade drum programming. What more do you need?

I've tried looking up more about Data Shit but have so far been unsuccessful. You can stream and download the entire EP over on Torn Flesh Records. 

Shpongle - Museum Of Consciousness

For me, Shpongle is the perfect music for the expansion of mind, body and soul; the perfect background noise for the ingestion of opiates, fungal hallucinogenics and dimethyltryptamine. However, even though I don't sit around fires chugging bowls of ayahuasca that often, I do feel that sometimes I am halfway there, thanks to Shpongle's ethereal "psytrance" (yes, that's a real genre) and its ability to take me other worlds. 

Museum Of Consciousness is apparently the final Shpongle album. If you are familiar with the group's earlier works, then what you can expect here is more of the same - in the greatest way possible. We're talking 9, 10, 11 minute trips into twisting, turning, lush musical worlds that are dripping in gorgeous instrumentation and driven by stoned yet purposeful beat programming. We're talking flutes, lutes, harps, synths, sitars. We're talking blips, blops, bleeps; whirls and whizzes. We are talking total clarity and immersion into the Museum Of Consciousness. 

The highlights for me are the two longest tracks; "How The Jellyfish Jumped Up The Mountain" and "The Aquatic Garden Of Celestial Delights". The former is a pacy, fluid journey through an audible hallucination, whereas the latter is a lurching, plodding epic of cataclysmal chill out proportion. Things get even weirder by "The Epiphany Of Mrs. Kugla", where the Shpongolians tread into territory that can only be described as a bombastic film score. I can conjure up swooping montages of a villain's lair; a damsel in distress, or a world gone to shit. And who is here to save us? Simon Posford and Raja Ram, most definitely. 

This thing is longer than 4 DMT trips. Think about that before you press play. 

DJ Senator - The Bassline / Roll Down Bass

Excuse my carpet.

This is a sticky-labelled 12" that I bought 2nd hand when I was experimenting with scratching back in the day (lol). I'd gotten a Ministry of Sound deck for Christmas and I needed some 90s-to-the-max shit to scratch and test pitch correction / matching on. As expected, I failed triumphantly at this shit and gave it up pretty quickly, although I did find it fun to scratch random records now and then, something which I have given up entirely since I've gained a serious respect for the vinyl medium.

The music on this 12" isn't particularly challenging or interesting in any way (both songs are based around THAT d'n'b beat - you know what I'm talking about), and if it wasn't for the school disco female vocals, the tracks could be ambiguously played at either 33 or 45 for a myraid of different atmospheres and effects. At 33, and devoid of vocals, it isn't a million miles away from Gyral / Stairway era Scorn. 

For some reason I can't bring myself to throw this away, although it has absolutely no value whatsoever. There is no Youtube available for this, so instead I'll offer you this useless tidbit of information: this was released on a Earache sub-label called Sub Bass Records in the early 90s when Earache was trying desperately to break into the d'n'b and rave scenes. Drastic.

Scatman John - Scatman (Ski-Ba-Bop-Ba-Dop-Bop)

SKI BA BOP BA DOP DA FUCKIN' BOP NIKKA

A bit of a jokey post for you, considering it's April Fools and all. Despite the ridiculousness of the content, this is a genuinely canon Lines In Wax post and has been added to the Collection page and everything. Ho ho! I got this alllll the way back on January the 2nd when I was helping my buddy Phil out at his job recycling textiles, and I saw it sitting on the shelf in a charity shop for 50p. For the sheer lulz that followed in the van for the next 5 minutes or so it was worth the money, especially since I wouldn't tell him what I'd bought; I guess he thought it'd be really heavy or something. Ha!

 

I remember back in the day when this was on every radio station and in rotation at every school disco the length and breadth of the UK. I don't particularly like the song, I'll be honest, but there's something about that cheap 90s dance vibe that really takes me back, y'know? Next thing I'll have the 12" of Cotton Eye Joe or something. Shit. That'll do. Fuck this. I'll see y'all tomorrow!

Scorn - Logghi Barhogghi

This album was the final recording that Mick did with any connections to Earache. The album itself was produced and "marketed" by Earache Records, but released by Mick's own label, Scorn Recordings. Logghi Barhogghi is only the second Scorn album after the departure of Nik Bullen, and still sounds a bit bare and unsteady on it's feet, just like it's predecessor, Gyral. Although, unlike Gyral, LB is much more straight forward and was a definite sign of what was to come with Scorn from this point on. The name Logghi Barhogghi came from when Mick Harris over-heard an American tourist trying to pronounce the town Loughborough; that's fecking highlarious!

From start to finish, LB is a stripped-back affair of clanking percussion and heavy beats. The moody synths and unusual atmospheres are held right back. LB is all about the beat! On the first few listens through, this took some getting used to. I thought this was a remix album or some sort of experimental spin-off project, but this is a fully-canon Scorn album, despite it's very basic approach. Some tracks are stompers; heavy programmed percussion looped over and over until your brain just can't take it no more, other songs are a bit more laid back; some even barely audible, with just a purring bass line and ticking beat. Every now and then the phatter-than-your-mudda bass lines come in, scarily pre-dating all this dubstep stuff by well over a decade. That's fucking incredible!

I will say though the basic beats make this record a great buy for rappers to practice / freestyle / write tunes to. However, for most folk this Scorn album is definitely going to remain a challenging listen, and sadly will more than likely remain unknown to the festering masses. But, despite its awkwardness, LB is so goddamn far ahead of it's time it's literally frightening.

NUH - Remixes Hideous Miscreation

I've not heard the source material for this remix, but I'm not entirely sure if I need to, if I'm honest. The thing with remixes of this nature is that the songs are usually so mutated from their original form that they have become brand new entities in their own right. Mixing gabba techno with awkward synths and nifty, sneaky little drum'n'bass passages, NUH really makes a fucking meal out of whatever source material Hideous Miscreation left to be devoured. Shit, I dunno whether to get up and dance or fucking smash my house to pieces. What a dilemma!

Side B continues the madness, opening straight up with more gabba brutality. Jeez! I'm proper loving this shit! Gonna be checking out more stuff by NUH in the very near future. Out thanks to Legs Akimbo Records, who seem to specialise in this unique brand of gabba-orientated punishment, and limited to 110 copies on evil black wax. Get in!

Daft Punk - Get Lucky

I am a total sucker for a catchy pop song. I guess you can't deny a well written song when you hear one, and Daft Punk, despite being awfully boring, have a rather large canon of well written songs. I think this might actually top "Aerodynamic" as my favourite Daft Punk tune, which has held the record for a very long time now; something like 13 years? Jesus fucking Christ I'm getting old (I really need to stop saying that; I'm only 24 for fuck sake).

I normally detest Pharrell Williams. I hate The Neptunes and their awful remixes, and I totally fucking detest N.E.R.D. with their try-hard bad boy rap shit. I gotta admit though I didn't know it was Pharell singing on this track until it was too late; the plant was seeded and the tune was being hummed before I knew what the fuck had hit me! Ha ha! But here, there's a certain soulfullness to his vocal performance that I can't really put my finger on. It might be the huge disco vibes giving this track a retro edge that's doing it; I'm not sure.

Anyway, the best thing about this song has to be the bass line, by a country mile! That bass rhythym is one of the best (not to mention funkiest) things that I have ever heard, so when I saw this (slightly over-priced) 12" in Spillers Records I couldn't resist purchasing this bastard. I'm gonna round this off now 'cos there's only so much I can really say about Daft Punk; I'll just let the music do the talking for me. Make sure you got the bass cranked all the way up on yer system for this one! Out on some crappy major label.

The Prodigy - Invaders Must Die (Box Set)

Hello and welcome to the Lines In Wax 250th post extravaganza! It's taken just over two years (and just under 20k hits), but we got there in the end, eh? It only seems like yesterday that I was doing the 100th post special; I can't believe how fast time goes. Anyway, here's to the next 250 posts...it's safe to say I already know what I'm gonna do for the big 500th - now that's thinking ahead. Cheers all!

Holy mother, look at the size of this package! (That's what she definitely did not say). Whilst I question the point in splitting an entire album over a series of 7"s (didn't Botch do something like this once?) I gotta admit that it looks absolutely fucking cool as fuck. Granted, it is a massive potch changing the disc over after every single song, but I did play them all through once just for the sheer fuck of it. The Prodigy seem to release all their own stuff these days through the oddly-named Take Me To The Hospital label, which is a sub-label of the UK independent Cooking Vinyl. This box is a walloper of a collector's item as you can probably tell from the photos, and it includes 5 orange 7"s, a CD/DVD version of the album, a bonus CD entitled Lost Beats, a poster and a bunch of graffiti stencils in case you love The Prodigy a little bit too much and have to tag that shit all up over the neighbourhood.

 

 

Invaders Must Die is a strong record. I'm not sure if it really is the logical progression for Liam Howlett and co., but there are plenty of absolute facking bangers in this little box. "Omen" I'm sure you've all heard a hundred thousand times on the tele; on music channels, as background music on TV programs from 2009 and as the theme song for every single fucking cage fighter this side of the fucking atlantic ocean. "Thunder" brings massive dub wup wups and ragga-man talky-talking to the table, whilst "Colours" is catchy and fast enough to still be played to the sweat-drenched, ecstasy-guzzling rave crowd. 

 

My favourite song on this album though would have to be "Warrior's Dance", which opens up all epic and grandiose as fuck, before breaking into a filthy beat led by a squeaky-voiced female that seems to have fallen out of  a crappy hardsytle mp3 mix and onto this record. As a rule I normally hate the squeaky-voiced shite that is slathered all over bedroom-grade dance music, but we all know that this vocal style was stolen from the rave scene and guess who were big leaders back then....The fuckin' Prodigy! So it's ok for them to use squeaky voices in songs. That's logical right? My second favourite song is actually the mostly-instrumental "Omen Reprise", that for a bit, almost sounds like latter-day Gary Numan. Unfortunately for purists, this short track is excluded from the orange 7"s for some pointless fucking reason. 

Just as unfortunately, Lost Beats isn't up to much, but it does make for some half-decent background music. I think that the beats should have stayed just that; lost. Despite that, this package is absolutely awesome as piss, but I wouldn't really recommend it to anyone unless they were a ginormous Prodigy fan. But, if that were the case, they'd probably own this anyway. I would severely recommend picking up the simple CD version though; if you love a bit of electronic music, that is. Right then, time to wrap this up. I've got an evening of snorting charlie and driving my Kappa-wearing slut of a girlfriend around the Gurnos estate in my Vauxhall Nova to attend to. 

Bjork - Debut

Bjork has always been one of those artists I've always been interested in but never got around to properly checking out. With my recent upgrade to Spotify Premium, I now have easy access to thousands of records I would otherwise overlook. Sure, I've always downloaded music, but typing "Bjork" into Spotify and pressing play is easier than researching a band and then finding links to the "best" record, downloading the .rar, importing into iTunes, yadda yadda yadda. Hence Bjork happened, after like eight years of being put off.

 

A few weeks ago my girlfriend Jo buggered off to New York for a week and left me in the house all alone. With absolutely nothing better to do with my time, I consumed my body weight in fried chicken and out-done my personal best in the consumption of bowls and blunts. One particular evening I smoked so much of "the good" that I pressed play on Bjork's Spotify page and let it run for five hours. What I did within that time I'm not entirely sure, but I imagine a large portion of it was spent staring at the wall. I decided soon after to buy some Bjork records. Go figure.

I started at the beginning, with Debut. It is no secret to most that Bjork is absolutely fucking batshit insane, so by her standards, Debut is as tame as a fat Persian cat loaded to the gills on catnip. There isn't any breakbeat here, or any enormously 90s dance vibes. There is a smattering of jazz and alternative instrumentation, even some dubby tracks and some with the old house feel. But what leads the whole circus is Bjork's somewhat retarded and Welsh-sounding - not to mention eternally mesmerising - voice. It literally sounds like a "special kid" has been given access to a million dollar budget and a high end studio crammed with all the musicians in the world. And I mean that in the nicest way possible. I might be a bit late to the party, but Bjork, I think I'm in love with you.

Alec Empire - Intelligence and Sacrifice

Another nostalgic blast from the past for me! Thanks to Zoverstocks selling on Amazon for 3p a record, I managed to get my hands on another album that I've put off buying for years. Before the artfags get all up in my grill about how my info on Mr. Empire is all wrong, I must tell you I write this all as an outsider to Alec Empire's / Atari Teenage Riot's long career(s).

This is another one of those albums that treads into the dangerous territory of mixing hardcore dance music with metal. As we all know, that either goes really well (The Berzerker) or really, really badly (Tourette Syndrom - sorry guys! Ha ha). Alec Empire tends here to stick to more digestible song structures that the two previously mentioned examples, so the chance of him going wrong is a lot lower. However, this record is definitely not for everyone. I'm not even sure if it is for me. I tend to come back to it every so often with a grin and a thought along the lines of "this is genius " but just as often put it back on the shelf thinking "Jesus, my head hurts, make it stop!".

There are some cracking stand-out tracks here, however. "Everything Starts with a Fuck" (both parts) is the best example of what this record is all about, and is, in a word: stonking. Lead single "Addicted to You" is simply just that; addictive, if you'd excuse the awful choice of words. And, for those of you with a disdain for the regular song structures, the album comes with a huge bonus disc of extra material filled to the brim with all sorts of weird shit; some of it bordering on harsh noise, some of it dancey, and some of it is just half-hour long ambient soundscapes. A bit of everything, then. In fact, the whole package is a bit much and a touch overwhelming. Out on DHR, which is Empire's own label.

 

Adrenalin Junkies - Outcry

As I am sure many of you are aware, Earache Records went through a puzzling phase in the 90s, signing all sorts of rave, dance, gabba and electronic music to the label. One such short-lived act was Adrenalin Junkies. There isn't much to say about this bog-standard dance record, other than I got it for next to nothing one day when I was buying a whole bunch of shit from Earache. I'm not even sure if this is collectable to fans of the genre this is associated with, but if anyone wants it just give me a shout as I am willing to sell / trade this as it is of no value to me whatsoever.

 

Mortiis - The Grudge (Single Edit)

 

I wasn't entirely fussed on Mortiis' much more metal approach in 2004 but there are some cracking tunes on The Grudge, including the title track, packaged here wittled down to a club-size bite. I can't blame Earache for wanting in on the electro-goth club scene audience that Mortiis so obviously appeals to, but the single edit is, in all honesty, fucking pointless. It takes a great song and makes it less great simply but cutting parts out of it. The Grudge as a song doesn't quite fall awkwardly into horrible chugging like some tracks off the album but simply showcases a rougher (and ALOT angrier) side to Mortiis whilst retaining the excellent synth and bass sound of earlier efforts.

On side B (or should I say AA) is "Decadent and Desperate", the big Mortiis single (in my opinion). Not quite sure why this is here if it was later repressed as a single (twice) in it's own right? Confusing move, Earache, I gotta be honest. "Decadent.." is muddy, riddled with angst only seen the ultra-bad part of nu-metal and is terribly mixed. It is far cry from anything off Smell of Rain. Mortiis is an excellent musician, not to mention performer, but this song is just hands down balls. Ironically, it was his best known song in the circles I hung around in at high school. People dug this song but shunned early Mortiis and even the album this was off! Moron fucking goths! Ha ha!