Etat Brut

Have just spent a pleasant while listening to the album "Mutations Et Protheses" by Etat Brut. Originally released as a double cassette back in 1981, the excellent Belgian Sub Rosa label has re-issued it in single vinyl LP format. Precious.
Very little is known about the sound/art project Etat Brut. They seem to have operated between 1980 and 1983 before disappearing. They collaborated with fellow Belgians Club Moral and appeared at the London Equinox Event back in 1983...but other than that information is scarce. Allegedly a duo with both members called Phillipe.
Perhaps it is the association with the Equinox Event that the sound of Etat Brut is thought of as harsh electronics / power electronics etc. "Mutations Et Protheses" album proves this to be far from the truth. The sound has more of a DaDaist approach / feel to it reminding me of early Cabaret Voltaire cassettes and Clock DVA, especially on "Hommes Nus" with its treated vocal, flowing bass, tweaked synthesizers and Dr. Rhythm beat-box.
Most tracks here are constructed from slow bass lines, tape manipulations, factory machinery electronics with repetition and pulsations from a primitive drum machine. The closest Etat Brut come to (what is now known as) power electronics is in the piece "Bande Sonore Du Film Paysage Mental" with a synthesizer being operated like an electrical power drill. This track may or may not contain elements of DDV & AMVK.
"Mutations Et Protheses" is a great example of how experimental electronic music sounded in the late 1970's / early 1980's. Post industrial (certainly) but pre any other categorisation for the experimental electronic genre. The opening track "Informations" sounded remarkably familiar. I don't remember owning any Etat Brut back in their days of operation, perhaps this track appeared on some cassette compilation ... anyone know?
As mentioned earlier - this LP is precious and essential.

Back in the mid 1980's I started collecting releases by the Belgian label Sub Rosa. They started out in 1984 with the excellent "Myths" series. Compilation albums mixing William Burroughs with The Camberwell Now and Eyeless In Gaza and S.P.K. with Hula and General Strike. Then they put out records by William Burroughs and Genesis P-Orridge and Test Department, it was a great label to collect. By 1988 I had lost interest in collecting records and such. Poverty, a drug habit and not really hearing what I wanted to listen to all added to my ennui. But now after buying the Sub Rosa CD/Book release by Baudouin De Jaer/Adolf Wolfli I am on their mailing list and salivating over their back catalogue! Their mail order prices are extremely reasonable, and Fred (the guy who runs Sub Rosa) is very friendly.
"Mutations Et Protheses" is available in black or green vinyl and limited to 500 copies. Visit www.subrosa.net and get a copy!

Pictures.
1: Etat Brut (Brutal State) logo.
2: "Mutations Et Protheses" LP Cover.
3: Picture of Etat Brut from "Force Mental" magazine.

Nowhere Man #2

On a rainy day in August Nowhere Island visited Torquay giving a chance for us citizens to have a look at our homeland. A touching moment for us Nowhereians.

Pictures.
1: The Embassy.
2: The Island.
3: Tamsin reading the Island propositions and adding one about all children to be taught knitting from an early age.

Half An Abortion

I don't think that I would ever buy a release from a project called Half An Abortion, in the valley of shite names Half An Abortion is down there. I feel the same way about Filthy Turd and Mutant Ape, I just can't see me listening to their releases because the name puts me off .. which is a great shame as the Turdster used to be a Cosmonaut who hailed Satan.
Half An Abortion reside in Leeds (rather like Filthy Turd and Mutant Ape ... well...West Yorkshire anyway) and is the solo project of Pete Cann. I have met Pete on a few occasions, first time in Exeter at the Dieter Muh / Silver Apples gig and he is a very decent chap. Decent enough to mail me a copy of his debut cassette "Anarmorphic Household Whelmer" and I am glad he did as otherwise I would never have heard his "sound". Once over the appalling name (I was in a group called Anagram Of Clit back in 1979...soon changed it though. I always think a project should have a name you can say in front of your mother) the tape is not a bad listen, a valiant first effort. Recording wise it has a touch of Duncan Harrison about it. (pink cassette too). The sound is vast, a live recording in an empty cellar with a twenty-foot ceiling.
The whole of side A is a piece called "Unraveller". Eighteen minutes long. Back in the early 1980's Z'ev performed in Derby, he had lots of pieces of metal tied to his body (pots and pans) and they were mic'ed up. The performance was Z'ev throwing himself about the stage .. and this is exactly what the first five minutes or so of "Unraveller" sound like. The vast emptiness of space give the track a dirty sound. Soiled. After the metal shenanigans the sound is of an untuned radio through a varity of effects pedals - frantic dial twiddling. Is this circuit bending noise? A high-pitched frequency noise slam? Has Pete listened to just a tad too much Putrefier?
Two tracks fill up side B. "Bewildered Squire" is a fantastic Yorkshire title. This piece is more abstract, Pete is doing something here ... but I am not quite sure what. Bottles smashed in anger, wood is sawn, metal is scraped and chains are rattled. Chaos in the crawlspace. Contact microphone madness. "A Rough Sunday" is a noise piece. Pure and simple (as Hearsay used to sing).

I am certain there are lots of cassettes like this one floating around the "noise" ether and Troniks Forum Board, and that does not make it a bad release, I enjoyed the first listen. Isabel F. (my three year old daughter) entered the room during the playing of side B and declared "I like noise" with a beaming smile, and I shall play it again...soon. I just hope by the time Pete puts out a second cassette he has changed his mind about the name.
The cassette is pro-duplicated and released on Pete's own Crater Lake label, it's a C40 with cover art by Travis Johnson - he who operates the excellent Ilse label. I'm not giving a contact address - I want interested folk to google "Half An Abortion"!

Nowhere Man

Ich bin ein Nowhereian.

IBF (Ideas Beyond Filth) #3

As a follow up to the "HuAsh" review, here is a clip of IBF performing a track from the cassette. "Baby" at the YMCA in Lincoln, January 1986. (Yeah, that's me with hair and terrible rhythm). The film was shot by Greg Rorke of Systemlaw Violator.

Victorian Electronics

I equate the Yorkshire label Striate Cortex with Basses Frequences and Apollolaan because they take time and care over their packaging of CDr's, not just putting it between to folded pieces of paper and sticking it in a PVC bag ... no, each release is itself a work of art and for that .. more power to them. The Plurals "Six Eyes" album on Striate Cortex is one of the best packaged releases I have.
So, Striate Cortex have just put out the compilation "Victorian Electronics" to celebrate their fiftieth release, and it is beautifully packaged. Four 3"CDr's in a small box with fold out insert and a small mat with a picture of the night sky over Leeds. The compilation even had a release party in Leeds last Saturday night where all the participants played live...would love to have been there, but this album will have to suffice for us non-driving Southern dwellers.

I have been playing the discs in alphabetical order ... not as listed on the insert. That's just the way I am. Ashtray Navigations provide two pieces. "Day Of Thor" reminds me of Skullflower during their "3rd Gatekeeper" period...but played on toy instruments. There's a lot of treble (where's the beef?.....no I still don't get it)*. "Day Of Thor" is a kraut-rock-wig-out tune that ends on a field of wailing and pounded keys with guitar feedback and amp-noise. Lovely. "Wren Became A Wimpy Bar" starts off all pots and pans percussion, it has an Eastern Mantra feel with the introduction of zithery sitar guitar and shakers. It made me want to dig out my old Eric Random LP's. Admittedly the keys do go a bit "Ray Manzarek" towards the end but it keeps a hypnotic pull. I have mentioned before that I saw and heard Ashtray Navigations about 15 years ago and Phil Todd (head Ashtray) kindly gave me their "Four Raga Moods" album, but I wasn't too impressed so I have not payed too much notice, then last year I saw them live in Cambridge and they damn well blew my socks off ... too late now to start on their vast back catalogue, but I am liking what I am hearing now.
Astral Social Club provide the single piece "Sinister Depilator". Here Neil Campbell is assisted by Foldhead member and Early Hominid Paul Walsh. The track comes straight in - it is a straight jump onto the spinning carousel. A blanket of pulsing drones and wild guitar frenzy (GNP), a fantastic piece that lasts seventeen minutes and fifty four seconds and is worth listening to for the great last four seconds....a masterpiece.
Midwich provide the twenty one minute piece "Verdigris". The green moss like residue that grows on old copper coins and pipes. The piece starts with old pipes, bells, pans and gongs being hit to create a resonance. Resonance and vibrations are throughout this piece, with the introduction of a Casio keyboard drone and phazered pulse. It's not a bad piece, just (to my ears) gets a tad "new-age". The spirit of Ian Boddy.
Playing this album set in alphabetical order leaves Daniel Thomas to last and the strangely titled "Beneath It All, Desire Of Oblivion Runs". Another twenty one minute piece that starts off with tonal frequencies, high pitched...like running old computer cassettes through a pitchshifter. ("IBM" by Throbbing Gristle) The sound changes into a machine driven guitar loop which changes into muffled lo-fi sub-aqua drone which changes into sequencers.....it all gets a little lost and loses its way....Daniel is no journeyman. The weakest of the four 3"'s.

All in all a great release, worthy for the Ashtray Navigations disc alone....ASC + Midwich tracks are bonus. "Victorian Electronics" is limited to 50 copies.

* Bart Simpson quote.

Pictures.
1: The Box.
2: The CDr's.
3: The Insert.

IBF (Ideas Beyond Filth) #2

The other day I received an e -mither from my good friend Tommy in Sweden. He had been out buying stuff and found a secondhand copy of the old IBF cassette "HuAsh". He snapped it up for 50 SEK - about a fiver in English money. A couple of things surprised me here - I am pleasantly surprised that the old IBF releases are still out there, slightly surprised that there are still copies around...after 27 years and a big surprise that the cassette was so bloody cheap! Bargainus.
The cassette was released in autumn of 1985 originally on the Manchester based Carnifex Recordings label but copies were shipped to various other distribution labels and it is my guess that this copy came from Peter Zinken/Bloedvlag Produkt. Unlike today it was general practice to mail a "master" copy to an overseas distro outfit and it was for them to copy the tapes, photo-copy sleeves etc. Supply and demand, so it is hard to say just how many copies are floating about. Today cassette releases are limited to 10, 20, 50 or whatever then withdrawn from circulation. Also back then a tape used to come without labels, just an ordinary TDK, Sony, BASF or whatever - never Memorex! All IBF cassettes through Carnifex Recordings were on TDK AD's. (A by word for quality back in them days). I remember Peter spray painting a lot of IBF tapes.
Anyway, the e-mither made me dig out my copy of "HuAsh" just to hear what Tommy was hearing, 27 years after the release! I remember five or six (great band) years ago ploughing through old IBF tracks to see what could go on the Harbinger Sound 12"EP, but I haven't sat down and listened to much since then. "HuAsh", or "Hammers Used As Hearts" to give the release its' full title was recorded and released in autumn 1985 - where Tim and I were on phase 2 of Ideas Beyond Filth. We had set up a studio in Monks Road, Lincoln using borrowed equipment from John Stafford (TEAC 244), ex-Diet Of Worms member Crabby (Synths & Sequencers) and local band DOD (Effect Pedals and Roland Drumatix). Tim and I had our own guitars, saxophone and shortwave radio. We began what Tim called "A Daily Regime" where we would build tracks in the studio five days a week...nine in the morning until four in the afternoon. Some days were creative - and on others mass ennui was evident. Sometimes Crabby and sometimes DOD member Simon Kane would join in .. but mainly it was just me and Tim. "HuAsh" took about five weeks to create.
Two tracks from the cassette; "Anal Sacs" and "Ka" made it to the Harbinger Sound 12"EP and it is obvious that these tracks are a cut above the rest, mainly due to their improvisatory creation and lack of the Roland Drumatix, the drum machine dates the sound. "Anal Sacs" uses an old "Dr Rhythm" drum machine and is a far superior sound, giving the piece a more "industrial / Cabaret Voltaire" feel. There are three tracks on the cassette - "Rollercoaster", "On:Mission 2" and "Subtle" where the lead sound is the Roland Drumatix and each track falls because of this. Very 1980's! But, we were experimenting, trying to discover a sound and we learnt that drum machine rhythms were out and looping sounds to provide rhythm and/or pulse was the way we wanted to go. The studio had a digital delay ~ joy! There is a great track on there called "Yellow Room" which is all amp noise and percussive chaos - I think it was called "Yellow Room" because we recorded it in the kitchen and the walls were yellow. The track "Coercion" is miss-spelt and became "Cohersion" due to my comprehensive school education, but the biggest embarrassment to me is the track "On:Mission 2". A solo attempt at disco, of funky guitar and slap bass with a lyric paying homage to the antics of Peter Sutcliffe. (Talk about getting it out of your system)!

The cassette has two sleeves, both Tim and I had a go at designing the cover and we couldn't decide on whose fitted the tape more, so we plumped on two covers. Tim wrote the sleeve credits and notes.

As mentioned, the prime tracks appear on the eponymous Harbinger Sound 12"EP that was released in 2009, but if you do see a copy of "HuAsh" about please snap it up and if you don't like it, I'll buy it off you ... it's worth about a fiver.

Pictures.
1: "HuAsh" Sleeve.
2: "HuAsh" Sleeve.
3: "HuAsh" Flyer.
4: "HuAsh" advert for Peter Zinken's "Material" magazine.
5: "A Daily Regime" Live. Ticket for 1986 Lincoln performance.