Heralded as one of the progenitors of black ambient music, Funerary Call returns from dormancy with his darkest release to date. "Dark Waters Stirred" is a ceremonial maelstrom of ominous electronics and dark ambient textures, an audial descent into ritualistic obscurity and misanthropy. Features guest appearances from the likes of Deathlord (Blasphemy, ex-Conqueror), and Troy Southgate (H.E.R.R., Seelenlicht) amongst others.
Out now on Fall Of Nature Records!
BT.HN & SISTRENATUS – EXPOSING THE RIBCAGE CDR now available
2010-02-26
Existence Establishment helps usher in the Canadian invasion with this brutal masterpiece of wall-noise drone. BT.HN (The Rita & Sick Buildings) and Sistrenatus (formerly Funerary Call) present one long harrowing track of pure depravity. Droning overblown synths, unrelenting spasms of crunchy distortion, and subtle atmosphere form a hopeless barrage of industrial waste.
Metallic silver and gold ink on heavy black stock.
Pro-pressed CDR limited to 250 copies.
Each copy individually numbered.
Damn, this is a viciously oppressive and powerful release! I can honestly say this sounds like the stuff of nightmares, a vicious and chilling fusion of noise, blackened ambience, and crushing grim industrial violence. In short, this is an absolutely classic Coldspring release! This album has ‘grabbed’ me, and sucked me into its shadow-strewn blackened intestines, ensnaring me in its filthy void… and you know what? I’m happy here! Seek to escape? Why? I’m completely ‘at home’ here!
This might sound ‘odd’ or ‘funny’, but if you have ever played the much-censured computer game "Manhunt" – this could be its perfect and harrowing accompaniment. It is totally disturbing, harrowing, and genuinely makes you (well, me anyway) want to look over your shoulder, in order to see what bloodied horror stalks your soul. Now let me tell you – albums this disturbing are VERY few and far between! Only Schloss Tegal’s "Black Staitic Transmission" comes to mind.
You may feel I’m exaggerating, but "Sensitive Disturbance" has truly nightmare-esque atmospheric and aural qualities to it. It is the unrelenting undercurrent of violence and menace, and the stark, cloying, dense claustrophobia evoked by its fetid and feral sound and feel that makes it feel so dizzying and dankly terrifying. This seven ‘song’ miasma of pain and misery clocks in at around 50 minutes, but feels like it lasts hours – NOT because it is boring, but because once you are lured into its unholy dead-world, you will feel that it is totally inescapable. A work of twisted sadistic genius! This is NOT for the faint-hearted! Enter at your own peril!
SENSITIVE DISTURBANCE is the third album of the Canadian combo called Sistrenatus and it sounds damn good. The seven tracks of the album tear down the barriers of industrial/noise/dark ambient music by mixing elements of each one of them with the only aim to create a tense soundtrack. For example, "Frequency Contamination" with its mix of synth waves, analog noises and metallic percussions is able to catch your attention immediately thanks also to its constant grew that brings in sudden power noise blasts here and there. "Rusted Earth" sounds like old good 80s industrial music but with improved sounds and at the end it turns into a death march thanks to distorted guitars and percussions just to fade into "Echoes From The Past" which expands this theme some more with the add of recitative vocals. "Lost Transmission" is another track where concrete noises are mixed with industrial sounds and dark ambient patterns but on "Forgotten" we reach the peak thanks to a perfect mix of melody, tension and crisp sounds. On this one, but generally on all the tracks of the album, Sistrenatus show their ability of balancing all the sounds creating a mix where everything is in the right place and for this reason their music sounds so effective.
CHAIN D.L.K.
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A couple of years ago I had the pleasure of reviewing the debut release of Canadian project Sistrenatus. The overall expression on the album titled "Division one" was tense spheres of harsh industrial-noise and orchestral black ambient. The same unsettling expression saturates this third shot from Sistrenatus, where the atmospheres of eeriness are intact, but this time accompanied by distorted guitar drones and brutal swarms of power electronics, as on the piece titled "Slow wave". On the lengthy track titled "Echoes from the past" a distorted male voice assists to create the feeling of hostility. The listener won't leave this album in tranquility, the feeling of darkness and depravity saturating the album, keeps the listener in constant awareness of what will come next. Dark and great work! (NM)
I haven't seen this yet but there's a Global Ear report on Vancouver's avant-garde music scene in the May issue of WIRE magazine. Check the website for free samples of some of the bands discussed... Ejaculation Death Rattle, Sistrenatus, Flatgrey, etc.
http://www.thewire.co.uk/articles/952/
Upcoming show
2008-02-09
Upcoming show
2007-12-03
December 8/07 Victoria, BC
Your BASEMENT is HARSH AS FUCK
DRIED UP CORPSE
SISTRENATUS
TASKMASTER
RUSALKA
griefer
coastal
brutophilia
night mother
froghat
sofaqueen
qlp
and more
Heathen Harvest review
2007-12-01
Regular readers of Heathen Harvest will recall how I go on and fucking on like a locked grooved record whenever I mention ‘one of the greatest record labels of all time ™’ that is Hermetique. This introductory paragraph will be no different. Toned down a tadge from the normal, even I run out of eulogizing occasionally, but still full of fan boy worship. If I can’t get you into this label and their releases then it’s not through the lack of trying on my part. Come on brothers and sisters. This label has brought you incredible, nay fucking life essential, releases from [Bleed], Radiodrama, Post Scriptvm, Dusk of Hope, Wrong Number, Negapadres, Cosmos Entropy and, of course, the master himself…Propergol. Now you can add another name to that illustrious catalogue of releases. sistrenatus. Things just don’t get any better than this. I am, at this moment in time, in seventh heaven. The agony and the ecstasy that comes from hearing anything, everything, put out by this label, and sub label, money just can’t buy. Well that’s a misnomer actually because money will buy you any of those releases. But you should be getting my train of thought here… misnomer or not.
sistrenatus is the work of one Harlow MacFarlane. I had the distinct honour to review his S/T 5 track CDR whilst on another website. I knew through just listening to that debut , although Harlow has recorded previously under the name Funerary Call, that here was a mega talent in the making. Someone that forcibly makes you sit up and take notice. The follow on release that eventually came out on Cold Spring Records, titled ‘Division One’, merely confirmed and cemented my earlier belief. That release was brilliant in its own right and is a ‘must have’ in any decent record collection. But nothing…absolutely fucking nothing…could prepare me for the noise devastation that is ‘Wrought Iron Railings’. Perspectives and preconceptions have been thrown to the wind. Reassessments are collated and the verdict is announced. ‘Wrought Iron Railings’ is a roller coaster maelstrom ride into Power Electronics and Death Industrial music that spins heads and turns stomachs with its ferocious stabbing assaults on the nerves and senses.
When you release a recording with guest appearances by Mr Propergol himself, Kenji Siratori and F/I/T/H’s Michael Page on a couple of tracks the quality assurance of the music will never be in doubt. All the usual gubbins that help create this style of music is resplendent here and given a glossy sheen to make the sonics fly from the speakers. Like the proverbial bat out of hell. All thunderous rhythms, distorted vocals, harsh Teutonic electronics that cause convulsions and tribulations, scorching waves of high frequencies and dynamic samples rule this little roost. Yes…we have all been here before. Propergol and F/I/T/H virtually re-wrote the power noise book single handily themselves through their amazing recordings. Let nothing though take away from just how astounding the sounds on ‘Wrought Iron Railings’ are. Sadistic aural savagery run amok. Utterly…perfect.
The musical genres that are covered by Harlow on ‘Wrought Iron Railings’ are littered with legends within their own spheres. The higher echelons that so many artists strive for and ultimately fail to attain. Within the space of just three releases Harlow now sits amongst those luminaries in my opinion. But don’t take my word for it. Seek out ‘Wrought Iron Railings’ for yourselves and then you’ll realise just how gob smacking, awe inspiring and down right fucking exceptional this piece of hardcore electronic music is.
Wow. Sistrenatus’ debut, Division One, was good, but this takes things to a whole new level. An absolute powerhouse of a recording…corrosive, rust filled projectiles colliding head on with searing hot blasts of noise and industrial clutter. Brutally loud and constantly in motion, this is relentless in it’s attack, hitting from all sides time and time again. The perfect marriage between power electronics, noise, and death industrial. This is obliterating stuff… I dare you to play it at full volume. Mandatory.
Wrought Iron Railings new album now available
2007-11-01
Beautiful packaging by Jerome and Lindsay! See merch section for ordering info.
