Acoustic-electronic and electro-acoustic modulating duo Jospeph Cramer and Noe Cuellar aka Coppice, recorded Cores/Eruct, the audio equivalent of wandering through a vast robot fabrication and repair facility. Things start slowly with opening track, “Bluing”, as if the facility is just starting-up first thing in the morning with more tentative machine noises going through a boot-up sequence. Yet, one can almost feel high voltage power build up, a kind of omnipresent hum permeates. The closest analogy is when one approaches a power transformer or power lines where electricity is felt as much heard. The power build up and tension is strong, looking for the machines to fully awaken for the discharge. “Son Form” is more animated with machines going through a preliminary integrity check, but the following “Seam (Kinder)” is where the facility is in full swing. If you put Cores/Eruct on a decent home stereo, you really can give your neighbors the impression you are running a mechanical factory from home. “While Like Teem Or Bloom Comes (Tipping)” is where I realize that Coppice reminds me of Pan Sonic, albeit less software and more electronics as they use Transmitters, a “modified boom box”, a “prepared pump organ”, “funnels” and “tape processes” though I do see a laptop in promotional documentation so I figure there is some software manipulation. These electronics are arranged in clever melodies and rhythmic compositions, much like Pan Sonic, only Coppice works with more visceral textures. The final track “Blueing”, is similar to opening “Bluing”, only it gives the impression of the plant winding down instead of up. End of work day. If you are into Pan Sonic but prefer more 'acoustic' mechanical textures, as in real machines, this disc is for you.

An existentialist listen in an increasingly existential world, Russia-based Umpio's meditative Opium Electronix Vol IV edition renders the meaning of life, meaningless. A cursory visit to the Umpio website proclaims, “There's no scene like no scene!”, now how existential is that? Or let us take the project name, Umpio, which means 'Vacuum' in Finnish, we are constantly directed to The Emptiness. Listening to this album is probably what being a part of the SETI Institute must be like, scanning the vast, endless heavens for an echo of a signal from some sentient civilization. Sure, you get the odd, random burst of radiation fluctuations, the flutter from a distant quasar, or probe signals bouncing off natural satellites. However, if you listen to deep space ambience long enough , you eventually get struck with the realization that whether there are other sentient beings or not is moot, we are all pulsing along with the Universe in unison, regardless of cognizance, a blip in the infinite. Opium Electronix IV is a live recording (in Finland) of a noise session by Pentti Dassum, the front man behind Umpio, culled from improvised feedback noise, electrical contacts, radio static, and tape loops, among other equipment. The results straddle the line between noise and ambient and what at first listen seems like empty static yields microcosms of life during deeper listens. These noises ebb and flow like tides against a cosmic shore with chirps and hums not different from crickets and other insects on a beach at night. A case where art unwittingly reflects nature, we are all a part of the void and the void is within us. A not unpleasant listen that facilitates meditative thought and deep insights.

An apt album to soundtrack Doom 5, should it ever come out. Especially the parts when your main character ventures through some narrow, dimly-lit tunnel where creatures grab at you from the darkness. Producer Kirill Rozhkov succeeds in crafting a horror narrative set in a post-apocalyptic world of desolate factories, torture chambers, unnerving subway rides, futurist ports and machine rooms, with the odd mosque-in-prayer session thrown in for effect. The opening title track, 'Meditzina Katastrof' starts off eerily enough, with vacuous noises and vintage broadcast radio voice-overs in Russian that gives way to creepy ambience and in turn is subdued by very nice power synth sweeps with a grandiose melody. 'Meditzina...' would fit perfectly on a 4AD compilation. The samples interplay nicely with heavy, electronic sweeps and canon-blast percussion. 'Sanatorium' has a bit of a haunted-house-in-a-theme-park vibe to it. An eerie wind is followed by an industral hum and what could be sinister growling or an idling mega truck. Further into the track, disembodied voices sing in chorus as austere keyboard notes from horror films join clanging from clumsy blue collar workers who cannot seem to get a firm grip on their tools. 'Island of Renaissance (Yersinia Pestis)' is rich and heavy in the low end bass and sets a tense backdrop for what could be a Russian horror radio play. Next, there is the torture chamber-esque 'Masha/Dasha' where voices dialogue calmly amidst a chorus of power tools and manic screams. To this listener, there appears to be a music box sample from the theme music to the 80's-era Twilight Zone. Towards the end of the track, as the samples hit a kind of crescendo, a heavy feedback drone washes in and sweeps the torture chamber clean for the next customers. Enter a ride on the world's most rickety and dilapidated subway train filled with workers who just finished a long stint in the salt mines and members of the Soviet arts council'on 'P424 (Snegir')'. People who murmur in Russian could be heard through cacophony of the train rumbling through a tunnel while opera singers practice vocal scales. 'Sweet Dreams' has nothing to do with the Eurythmics, rather a rumbling bass-drone is a canvas for a recitation of the opening passage of the Quaran, followed by a collective 'amen'. I will hazard a guess that the voice over is probably from a Chechyn talking about being a Mujahid (Jihadist martyr). Given Russia's ventures in Afghanistan, Chechnya, and now Syria, I could see how this could be part of the topical horror theme. Now, I realize 'Vaccination of Work' is supposed to be yet another horror-themed track, but to my ears, the power-surge generator hums remind me of the giant robots of Pacific Rim, while the chatter of men and assorted mechanical bleeping and clamor from machines could easily pass for a maintenance bay. Go robots! 'Official Version' closes the album on a decidedly sci-fi note with a bit of an eerie tinge. Wind chimes play against oscillating tones wile looped voices are steeply reverbed as if in a cavernous room. The noise could pass for a space station bay with chirps from a control station. Meditzin Katastrof is an issue of a 2003-2004 recording session in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Though the packaging is minimal, a simple cardboard sleeve, the design is a work of Industrial-esque art and hand numbered. If you are into dark, horror movie sound scapes with a tinge of sci-fi, this disc is for you.

Antinatalism is a broad term that means, more or less, the voluntary extinction of humanity. There are varying schools of thought about how this can achieved, a minority believe this can be done through violence but most advocate humanity simply stop having children. The driving idea behind this belief is that humanity is a detriment to the Earth and to each other such that it would be better if we did not exist at all. Indeed, there are even some religious schools of thought who concur that it would be better had Man never existed. This is a bleak solution for a species capable of reason and and modifying behavior to embrace less destructive paths, but a cursory glance at news headlines suggests otherwise.

One only needs to look at the title of the opening track to see where Sluice Room stands in the spectrum of antinatalism; 'Here's What I Think of Your Gift (Parental Homicide).' When you hit play, the Antinatalist Variations opens with all the subtlety of someone pouring a jug of ice water down the back of your neck. Layered harsh textures of noise that seem to come from electric guitar distortion, elongated into a continuous and abrasive drone field, and then run through a series of effects. However, Sluice Room does not share their methods of audio mayhem, so the sounds could come from other sources. There are four tracks here that range from just over seven minutes to just over twelve, each as cataclysmic as the last.

Parts of 'Here's What I Think...' resonate with an intense, low-end reverberation that adds an evocative texture to the otherwise harsh effects of distortion, giving the stereo woofers a good work out. The following track, 'Secret Exit Path' has interesting frequencies that evoke the film, White Noise, starring Michael Keaton, which is about Electronic Voice Phenomenon (EVP) wherein the dead try to communicate with the living through analog cel phone, television and radio signals. The undulating textures of noise are such that the ear can almost make out human voices that seem to struggle through the dense field. My ears strain to decipher what they have to say. Next, we have 'The Forced Meat Goose Step', which has less harsh noise fields and accompanied with rhythmic mechanical clicks but mid way through some powerful generator surge pulses kick-in, followed by banshee-like distortion screeches that could be rage or agony or both. Then again, this is just noise and the human brain strives to 'humanize' sounds that could come from mundane sources. The Antinatalist Variations Closes with 'Cloistral Convalescence', which offers an industrial grade drones and low end reverberations, co-joined with what seems to be mechanical power tools that cut through...the artist's parents, perhaps? The packaging and track titles set for darker overtones but the sounds are some hefty, relentless noise with a wide enough range of textures and intensities to keep the listener engaged. Some very nice noise that stands up to repeated listens. Should these talents be of the violent variety of Antinatalism, we may not hear what other sounds they cook up (or forge) next, and that would be a pity.

Apparently, the word, 'Glice' was coined by Justin Bieber who inadvertently spliced 'glad' and 'nice' when he replied to greetings as in, 'It was glice to meet you'. This may or may not where Amsterdam-based noise experimentalists Ruben Braeken and Melle Kromhout got the moniker from. Perhaps it means something else in Dutch or maybe it is just a word that sort of sounds cool. The album cover art, suggests reference books on magmatic rock and studies on minerals deposits, mostly compliments the music nicely. I say mostly because it does not account for the ban's more whimsical side. Subsequent, 'deeper' listens to 51433213 trigger not unpleasant recollections of Saturday afternoons as a child watching old Godzilla films on TV. The analogy fits because the often jarring and cacophonous audio effects that clamor through this ep suggests jams by Godzilla and friends from monster island--when not stomping on cities and hapless inhabitants. Not one for elaborate album titles, Glice starts off with 'J', where Megalon croons ironic, post-rock vocals while Godzilla joins in with instrumentals, at first lightly strumming high-voltage power lines, then gradually agitating the power transformers to get just the right power chords mid-way through. Understated backing vocals are provided by King Ghidorah. The next track, 'Q', is where Godzilla probably got a claw full of tightly wound fiber optic cables still riveted to the ground and with enough tension to pluck out some resonating, bulbous basslines. Midway through, Godzilla picks up an idling farm tractor for its rhythmic staccato effect before charring it to a molten husk with his breath in a kind of improvisational flare. On 'B' we have Gigan on guest vocals while our favorite giant lizard tries to figure out the inherent benefit of power transformers, modulated to varying megawatts to get just the right reverberating drones. The ep is capped with 'U', Mothra's cover of Bruce Springsteen's 'I'm On Fire', a song I'm sure most on monster Island can relate to. Lots of exotic and abrasive textures are on this album with enough effects to do your head in, but sometimes delivered with the uninhibited abandon of a 4 year old given a mic and sound system to play with after being fed a tray of brownies and a pitcher of Kool-aid. Sheer nuttiness and larger-than-life noise.

Now Glice also asked their follow-up one-track EP, 'H' also get reviewed. This one is a bit more reliant on vocals, which seem more incantational. Sort of like a cult calling for an encore of the monster jam band while also firing up a sub-dimensional device to open a portal and bring some more mega oddities from 'other-realms-of-there'. With any luck, Cthulu will join in. Lots of vocal effects and electronic modulations that intensify near the end of the track. The portal is open and the story will be concluded in Glice's upcoming full length. Bring your safety gear.