If you enjoyed the desolation and brutality of the NWW PLAY TNB LP, you’ll be very happy with the CD version which is called Changez Les Blockeurs And (DIRTER PROMOTIONS DPROMCD138), credited to Nurse With Wound. Besides both sides of the LP burned on, you get the bonus track ‘And’, an episode well worth adding to your aural repository of evil noise even if not a TNB completist. It seems to “complete” a trilogy started by the previous cuts, of which the first was somewhat abrasively harsh and the second billowed out a supernatural calming hush.
By contrast, ‘And’ is a futuristic mesmeriser with “metallic” undercurrents, like some grotesque update on the music of SPK recast for a more mysterious setting…the sonic elements keep spinning around remorselessly, like the steel plates of an evil juggler from the dark realms…or a genuine whirling hall of knives you must endure in some house of horror. Though the track may begin quietly, ere long it grows into an all-consuming force, surrounding and constricting us with its mighty loops. Once again I grudgingly admit the compositional skills of Steve Stapelton have a subtlety and directness that is slowly winning my respect. What layering…at the same time, Richard Rupenus never issued anything as almost-melodic as this in his career (there is a simple hornpipe tune lurking somewhere in the midst of this relentless cascade, unless it’s produced by “ghost” notes in my imagination).
28 minutes in length, this only does one thing and moves in one direction, but is as efficient as a cyborg armed with huge blades cleaning the streets of human rubble as it advances. Though he does it by different routes and methods, NWW achieves the same heavy sense of total futility as TNB, one that stays with the listener for some time. I have no idea how this burnished wall of iron plates was constructed, but it doesn’t matter…it’s like a force of nature that must simply be accepted. Collectors should note different cover artworks than the vinyl too. From 22nd October 2018.