Two more items from the American CDR label No Part Of It received on 28 Sept 2022. Here be two compilation CDs with similar cover art, both entitled Paroxysm and subtitled “A Benefit Compilation for Leslie Keffer”. This is the artiste whose early work we heard on the fine Reverie collection (see previous post). Apparently she suffers from epilepsy, not a pleasant condition, and her state has worsened to the extent that she found herself all but unable to produce new work. She’s also been trying to receive disability payments, and what little I know about the American healthcare system (quite unlike the UK’s state-sponsored scheme) doesn’t fill one with confidence about the success of that enterprise. The record label thus elected to produce these benefit compilations “to ease some of that financial tension”.
On Paroxysm #1 we have 13 tracks, one by Keffer (an eerie song made of looped segments with nasty insects purring nearby), plus Temple Ov Saturn, a would-be esoteric type with cold wave tones and a drum machine that won’t quit; Military Position, who is Harriet Kate Morgan from Australia and offers her own brand of power electronics with murderous vocal utterances; Testing Vault, an Italian industrial genius named Daniele Santagiuliana who draws influence from occultists such as Coil and Cyclobe; Anakrid, i.e. Chris Bickel who runs the Stereonucleosis Recordings label in the USA; rEEk, an odd fellow named Jason Lazer who may also have some connection to Blood Rhythms; Sons Of God, the Swedish art musicians Kent Tankred and Leif Elggren; Allessanda Zerbinati, an extreme Italian noise artist who performs naked and often streaked with blood to boot; Jonathan Canady, who is also Angel of Decay and Diamond Cult; Envenomist (David Nathan Reed); Illicit Relationship, a noise duo from Texas; and Ravenna. Of the two discs this one appeals to me the more; it’s mysterious, full of unexpected lurking terrors, all the pieces complement each other, the sequencing is good, and listening to the entire set imparts the expected sensations of nausea and existential dread.
On Paroxysm #2 are 15 tracks by people whose names I don’t know too well – Andrew Kirschner, who runs a label called Mistake By The Lake Tapes in Cleveland; Sharkiface, a duo of women noise artistes; the Canadian Fletcher Pratt, who runs Midori; Developer, sometimes called Teethface, from Ohio; The David Russell Snake, who once made a cassette for Hanson; Skin Graft; Tusco Terror, one of the few acts here who appear to be an actual band and not a solo noisenik; Christina Carter of Houston who was in Charalambides; Orphan Fairytale, another female solo act, this time from Belgium; and others. I’m finding a bit more retro harsh noise violence here than I was expecting and kinda prefer the sinister droning ones, and there’s no real standout track that I could name, and the comp doesn’t really make for a satisfying sequence; but even so you’re bound to pry loose a few nuggets of joy from the array. It’s been quite an education for me personally to discover so many new names from the international noise and industrial undergrounds.