oxen – D E C A Y C A S T Magazine

Andorkappen, LA based noise/ drone maestro and also honcho at Underground Tape Review is back with “Temples Of The Unvirtuous”, on one of our favorite labels, OXEN, also an LA based imprint. “Temples Of The Unvirtuous” begins with a slow, low, hollow drone which barely is able to escape the speakers, however this distant drone steadily becomes a thick, warm, comforting, whirring sawtooth buzz accented by a steadily rising sine wave pitch poem, steadily climbing the ladder or alienation and confusion. This is the style of synthesizer drone music i have been waiting for, stripped, raw, warm, an a-tonal form to atone to. The bass forward drone, and the high pitched ring, engrosses the hearing until the sound is like a shaking, microscopic robotic insect drone which has entered the brain via the ear canal. You now have become rather UNcertain of what the future may hold.

The drone remains omnipresent, now navigating the innards of your nervous system with its sweating, pulsing, reverberations of mechanical hell, yet somehow this hell is soothing and relaxing, like the warm hum of distant machines that will eventually come to end our life, but for now have taken respite across the desert, gently vibrating and breathing, not quite ready to attack yet. The high pitched buzz has gently, yet in a fixed, determined manner become the musical crescendo and de-crescendo of the A side, and of course the bass for the B side, but rest assured, no matter how your body takes it’s new implanted oscillations, things will be different. Even though this evil sound appears distant it will slowly, steadily and eventually forcefully remap the sonics of your nervous system until you are violently, shaking uncontrollably in a pile of confusion and as you collapse onto the floor, the buzzes cease to exist, and all that’s left is a tiny mechanical bee buzzing against a dark, barren, abandoned landscape, ominously and microscopicly floating in limbo, waiting for it’s next unknown victim.

You can order the cassette from OXEN Label HERE!

DECAYCAST Reviews: SPORE SPAWN “Ochistuitara” Cassette (Oxen Records, 2017)

Spore Spawn is a nearly decade old project based out of Japan, and also happens to be an end level boss in the popular fan favorite video game, Metroid.

The project name choice is Probably not an accident based on the title and aesthetics of the artists imprint, 16 Shots Per Second but this cassette is released by Leah and Matt’s imprint OXEN, based out of LA. “Ochistuitara”, from Tokyo’s underground legend SPORE SPAWN, boasts a twenty minutes’ sacrifice of masterfully crafted, exciting, kinetic, dynamic harsh noise, and supposedly is made from a myriad of homemade joystick synthesizers and crude noise devices. While essentially existing in the harsh noise realm, “Ochistuitara” actually covers a rather wide and refreshing array of harsher sounds, compositional strategies and dynamics, and even musicality at times, almost a virtuosic approach to harsh noise. Spawn creates dense walls of feedback that violently and aggressively cascade into spacious vignettes of ambient drone, expertly blended field recordings, slow rhythmic pops, and chirps like a glitched- out, off-kiltered, dying alarm clock that fights the plug to stay in the wall when it’s angrily yanked out. The walls of blistered, busted out, serrated chaotic mayhem crescendo into utter sonic chaos, and just as the ear bleeds for mercy rescind into a cold, alienating, isolating hum. At times, the ambient sections act as a break from the unrelenting mountains of noise, and other times, function as matrix of brain mutes with respect to the ear fatigue. Loud is only loud when quiet is quiet, and on “Ochistuitara”, the artist is no doubt conscious of this strategy in respect to the timing and composition of this EP.

xxx

Things never stay the same to become predictable or flat, Spore Spawn is constantly shifting though wavetables of disorientation, fear, chaos, tension, and even a few brief moments resolve. The tones themselves have a cold, digital body, while swells of analog chaos modulate themselves and the sharp digital pillars of extreme sonic swells and decays, and the start /stop style of aggressive noise, on more than one occasion even function as a “drop”. What was dropped we don’t know, however it carved a deep impact into the ear canal, even noted on one of CLIPPING‘s year end best of lists! In short, this is a must have for fans of ASTRO, K2, early MERZBOW and even some of the work of CLIPPING themselves. OXEN continues to remain at the forefront as one of America’s most aesthetically and conceptually consistent harsh noise labels. Grip this fantastic tape before it’s too late. Here’s a few world from OXEN that represent the complexity and brevity of this EP flawlessly,

“Ochitsuitara brings any fan of modern harsh noise (nostalgists won’t be disappointed though maybe not specifically catered to) closest to articulating what it is that sets Spore Spawn apart from decades of legendary noise pioneers, his modern myth building utilizing swirling loops of cacophony and squelching stabs, uncompromisingly outpacing any modern competition in his unique patterns of ecstatic jarring drunken fervor and (sometimes) vocal delivers closely woven into and through electronics culled from homemade disused gaming controllers. Just harsh as fuck. All measurements of harsh noise enjoyment of this genuinely gifted noise artist will be vastly rewarded and on abundant display on Ochitsuitara.”

OXEN LABEL

ORDER THE TAPE HERE

SPORE SPAWN Soundcloud