I was unfamiliar with Throat, but they seem to be a noise rock band out of Finland. This is a remix of their album Bareback done by a veritable who’s who of the noise scene. Indeed, the label warns that “if you are looking for straight-up noise rock or new Throat material and can't stand to have your head pierced by harsh noise power tools, this release may not be for you.” Well, lucky for me, harsh noise power tools sounds like a good time, so I think I can manage. I resisted listening to the source material, as I wanted to listen to this on its own merits.

You really can’t go wrong with the artists that are on this. The remixes are provided by Government Alpha, Himukalt, Deison, Black Leather Jesus, Sshe Retina Stimulants, Vanhala, Heat Signature, Like Weeds, Linekraft, Lasse Marhaug, Concrete Mascara, Erratix, Niku Daruma, Kazuma Kubota, Jarl and KerÄnen. Rather than hit every single thing on here, I will hit the high points on this set and focus on the different approaches.

First, there are some that took a less “in your face” noise approach. For example, Deison brings an interesting mix of Recut that’s more atmospheric than noisy, with relatively untouched vocals. After the onslaught of Government Alpha and Himulkalt, this was an interesting juxtaposition, and well done. “Bone Strike” by Erratix was likewise quite lovely with an atmospheric and stripped-down approach. Indeed, the second disc is a lot more ambient while still maintaining some grittiness and noise.

Others, such as Concrete Mascara (“Recut”) sound like they took the original and destroyed it with about twenty layers of distortion. Others go well beyond this though. For example, Lasse Marhaug brings in a behemoth of a remix of No Hard Shoulder. At over 11 minutes, this could easily be seen as a remix in three movements. At first it almost sounds like he is content with taking the original track and running it through a Gristleizer, but after a while it becomes more and more deconstructed and remade into an image that it never anticipated. Toward the end, all that's left is a drum beat and heavy oppressive drone. This is nicely done and probably one of the few that end up being a noise remix of the original rather than something simply inspired by the original. Vanhala also brings in a completely cut up and destroyed mix of “Born Old” that ends up being almost cheerful and whimsical in its cut ups; this one was a lot of fun.

In general, this is a good compilation of tracks, but with this group of artists the music would have been good regardless. One could easily just ignore the fact that these are remixes, which I find somewhat unsatisfactory. After all, I actually like remixes when they are done well. I suppose that this is a good way to have some cross pollination between the harsh noise scene and Throat / noise rock fans.