Of course this is happening the weekend I leave Sweden: on July 27-28, Börlange will host the new music festival War & Hate which will feature a brutal assortment of metal and power electronics acts such as Brighter Death Now, IRM, Omnizide, Survival Unit and many more. Full details: http://www.warandhate.se/
On the other hand, if chain-rattling industrial-noise really is your thing you can't really go wrong with Brighter Death Now for unsettling, but eminently listenable, aural chaos. I'm still waiting for my copy of the new 4xLP boxset "Very little fun" to show up, but luckily there are mp3s floating around to satiate me in the meantime.
Brighter Death Now - Collector of remains
After an extended break due to depression and divorce, Sweden's definitive dark ambient label is once again getting the ball rolling: http://www.coldmeat.se/home.html
Many new releases are reportedly planned, the first of which being the 3CD/3LP box "Very little fun" from Brighter Death Now.
Swedish power electronics master Brighter Death Now will be doing a number of rare live dates coming up:
09/24 - "Dom" Cultural Centre, Moscow (RUS)
09/28 - "Revolution" Club, Saint Petersburg (RUS)
10/09 - Maschinenfest, Essen (GER)
11/04 - Wroclaw Festival, Wroclaw (POL)
02/20 - VII Congresso Post Industriale, Prato (ITA)
Cold Meat Industry will be releasing Brighter Death Now's US live debut from back on Friday, June 13, 2003 in Chicago as a live album entitled "Where dreams come true: Live in Chicago". Due out April 23, 1000 copies only. Full details: http://www.coldmeat.se/mailorderf.asp?id=2896
Musique Machine on the Brighter Death Now reissue "Necrose evangelicum": http://www.musiquemachine.com/reviews/reviews_template.php?id=1908
Cold Meat Industry is reissuing the 1995 Brighter Death Now "easy listening" album "Necrose evangelicum" as a special 2-disc digipack with a bonus live disc. More info: http://www.coldmeat.se/mailorderitem.asp?id=2475
Here's the playlist for this week's special spooky/scary Halloween edition radio show:
01. TALK 1
02. Entombed - Hollywood Babylon
03. ARM - Humming bug
04. Camouflage - Oktober
05. TALK 2
06. Notre Dame - Red Cross
07. Sanctum - Lie low
08. Bay Laurel - Pale colours
09. TALK 3
10. At the Gates - Blinded by fear
11. Frode Haltli - Lude
12. Brighter Death Now - Little baby
13. Death Breath - Lycanthropy
14. TALK 4
15. Breach - Mr. Marshall
16. The Skull Defekts - Carved in bones
17. The Cardigans - Mr. Crowley
18. TALK 5
19. Diabolique - Catholic
20. Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words - Masks, walls and other ways to keep things out, to keep things in
21. The Bear Quartet - Broken heart
22. Mercyful Fate - Come to the Sabbath
23. TALK 6
24. Beyond Dawn - Cigarette
25. Pimentola - Heart's dementia (Phase I)
26. Repoman - Chemically obsessed
27. TALK 7
28. MZ412 - Infernal affairs II
29. Satyricon - Nemesis divina
30. Switchblade - Selfdestruct schematics / Open aftermath
31. TALK 8
32. Rasion D'etre - Metamorphyses Phase IV
33. Cortex - We are the dead
34. TALK 9
35. Emperor - I am the Black Wizards
Hey look, a new Brighter Death Now album is on the way: http://www.coldmeat.se/mailorderitem.asp?id=2106
The record is entitled "1890" and will be available on vinyl or as a digital download only.
My playlist for this week's radio show on Sirius:
01. Bogus Blimp - By five o'clock tea
02. TALK 1
03. Sivert Høyem - Smalltown supersound
04. Pluxus - Kinoton
05. Brick - No names
06. TALK 2
07. Hebosagil - Let us go
08. Dialog Cet - Crocodile hunt
09. Hurdy Gurdy - Ynglingen
10. Anja Garbarek - The last trick
11. TALK 3
12. E.S.T. - When god created the coffee break
13. Miss Li - I'm sorry, he's mine
14. Afenginn - Ralli i d-mol
15. Magyar Posse - Whirlpool of terror and tension
16. TALK 4
17. Susanne Sundfør - I resign
18. Sällskapet - Nordlicht
19. Nisse Hellberg - Kärlekens express
20. TALK 5
21. The Spacious Mind - Rider of the woodlands
22. TALK 6
23. Him Kerosene - Ladybugs
24. Svenson - Don't get lost
25. Namur - Marching
26. TALK 7
27. Tellevika + Firefox AK - Eric
28. Carpet People - A girl without a skin
29. Anna Ternheim - Lovers dream (feat. Fyfe Dangerfield)
30. Knife and Ape - No arms no legs
31. TALK 8
32. Brighter Death Now - American tale
A new month and a new Record Club selection means that my usual Friday flashback post has been preempted. June's pick: "Fall, fall, falling" from Göteborg-based artist Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words, an absolute crushing record. As DLSODW mainman Thomas Ekelund himself puts it, "It's about yearning, for what was, for what could've been or for it to never have existed. It's about breaking down...apart... up. It's about grotesque reactions and the distortion of memories. It's about self-destruction, -mutilation and -loathing. It's about scars/shards. It's about that sinking feeling. It's about falling." Make no mistake, this is a devastating work, but like all of the best doom-oriented music, its innate sense of foreboding and suffocation is tempered with aching beauty. It's in the darkness that the inspiration and the will to carry on is rediscovered. This is not brutality for brutality's sake, like Brighter Death Now for instance, this is looking deeper.
Previous Dead Letters work tended towards minimalist drone and, while that's still very present, Ekelund has now started to work with much more well-defined rhythms and melody. Today's mp3 selection "Ashen like the sky" is one of the more extreme examples, sounding something like Godflesh buried at sea. A lot of electronic music can seem cold and distant, but I find that Dead Letters always retains a strong sense of earth or organicness, something I attribute to the fact that everything he does sounds as if it's been rolled in shit and dirt. The method behind the music is digital, but the feeling is very human, very real. The result is very powerful and, naturally, very highly recommended.
Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words - Ashen like the sky
Cold Meat Industry is doing a bunch more of their international showcase gigs:
01/06 - Werk21, Zürich (SWI) w/Brighter Death Now, Raison d'être, Deutsch Nepal, Bocksholm
02/04 - The Corner Hotel, Richmond (AU) w/Raison d'être, Brighter Death Now, Bocksholm, Shinjuku Thief, Manticle
02/05 - The Corner Hotel, Richmond (AU) w/Brighter Death Now, Deutsch Nepal, Atomine Elektrine, Frozen Faces, Isomer
02/28 - La Locomotive, Paris (FRA) w/In Slaughter Natives, Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio, Brighter Death Now, The Protagonist
04/23 - Koko, London (UK) w/Ordo Rosarious Equilibrio, Raison d'être, The Protagonist, Brighter Death Now, In Slaughter Natives, Deutsch Nepal
Cold Meat Industry is sending its flagship artists Brighter Death Now, Raison D'etre and Deutsch Nepal to Australia for two shows in Melbourne at the Corner Hotel in February. Full details: http://www.coldmeatinoz.com/