After ARCHE and the [mode of] tours, DIR EN GREY have decided to make a more "straightforward" (in a way) album. The sound of the previous three albums is given a metalcore spin on here, and as much as I love Keibetsu to Hajimari and Devote My Life, the second half where it slows down a little might be better overall. While I don't really have an issue with the production, you might do. Check out live performances of these songs in that case. From what I've noticed, The ... read more
3rd BIRD: YURIKAMOME / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/183677-13-japanese-birds-parts-1-13/
This part is dedicated to the Black-headed gull! The first track, Black Headed Gull is kinda like something from Fukurou, the drums are front and center for the entire 32 minute runtime. On February 2002 this industrial loop keeps repeating, the drums are probably at their weirdest yet, drones and other noises also appear, but it's later in the track where they're more prominent. ... read more
That polish part in Le nez dans les etoiles caught me off guard. Basically what @ScottShelby said, good stuff. I should probably check out some more Faust.
Do You Want More? is cut off on streaming for some reason, the actual track is 9 minutes long, not 2.
Did I just listen to a Merzbow release outside of a boxset? Yes! Dolphin Sonar is Merzbow's protest album against the annual slaughtering of some 2500 dolphins in Taiji, Wakayama Prefecture Japan. Does it succeed at communicating with dolphins? Probably not. Does it succeed as a noise album? Sure.
Part 1 envelops this pulsating beat in a sea of noise which later on in the track gets a little crazier for a bit, that pulsating beat is nowhere to be found, probably replaced with something ... read more
2nd BIRD: FUKUROU / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/183677-13-japanese-birds-parts-1-13/
This one is dedicated to the Owl! A much quieter and relaxed release when compared to the previous one, throwing you these reserved higher pitched noises rather than loud noise walls. You'll hear this difference right from the get go on Gorosukehoukou. The next track, Variation No.1 sounds like the night, almost like a field recording if not for some sounds. The drums are really sparse ... read more
1st BIRD: SUZUME / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/183677-13-japanese-birds-parts-1-13/
The first of the series is dedicated to the Eurasian tree sparrow. You can hear Masami play the drums here, something he started doing again in 2008. It reminds me of Hodosan, with its drumming and noise.
The first track Red Bird of Summer Part 1 is the longest as it's nearly 20 minutes long; the noise starts off pretty harsh, only to "calm down" the further you are in the ... read more
13 Japanese Birds | 13 of 13 | 71 | February 8th, 2025 - February 21st, 2025
Destroy the Cages, Burn Down Research Facilities, Escape From Captors
The series (as it's name suggests) is dedicated to 13 different birds which appear in Japan. It spanned from January 2009 to February 2010, one album was released each month (there was a minor exception but that isn't really important).
REVIEWS/RATINGS & CLOSING WORDS BELOW
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Bird 1 | Suzume (Eurasian tree sparrow) | 76 | ... read more
The first disc is already its own journey, two discs together, oh boy. Even with the repeats the discs are two completely different performances. Amazing jazz fusion with metal and other genres I'm too stupid to pick out in the mix, sometimes it's gonna be chill and/or beautiful, sometimes it's gonna be insane. And it was all recorded live!
Crazy crossover, crazy track. Never in my life would I think I would see a Squarepusher remix of a Machine Girl track.
FANTAIL VISION / 6th CD / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/916715-fantail-vision/
🎉 ANOTHER BOX SET FINISHED 🎉
Recordings made between February to June 2022. When it comes to the first half [Magnetic Rain No.2, Magnetic Rain (Drop#1)], I guess the title describes how they sound. The more interesting tracks are the second half [Bayanoise 1 & 2). Noise is played on top of the bayan (Russian/Ukrainian instrument, it's similar to an accordion), the tracks being shorter ... read more
FANTAIL VISION / 5th CD / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/916715-fantail-vision/
Tracks recorded between 2020-2022, one of them in an outtake from Animal Liberation - Until Every Cage Is Empty.
There are some nice ambient drones on a few of these tracks, obviously Masami merzes all over them. On Feb 17 the noise actually has little stops in it and doesn't overpower the layers of synths forming the drone. Animal 417 has this repeating mechanical sound which gets drowned in ... read more
FANTAIL VISION / 4th CD / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/916715-fantail-vision/
And now we have the unreleased stuff! Kinda. Hinawave #1 is another mix of Hinawave #2 which Merzbow contributed to the MUTANTS MIXTAPE Vol. 6 compilation, didn't think I'd ever see Merzbow and "Arca's Discord server" in the same sentence. Looks like Merz put granular synthesis to use on the track, it sounds like he used water as the source. Besides that, there's this ... read more
Amazing LRD performance, the lo-fi sound here both helps and works against it depending on how you look at it. The repetitiveness of the backing band is hypnotic and Mizutani's guitar gets really noisy, scratching all the good places in your brain. I get the complaints about Mizutani's singing, but sometimes you just need a dude to sing like that; I can't really imagine these songs with a different vocal style. '77 Live is: loud, psychedelic, fun, melancholic & ... read more
FANTAIL VISION / 3rd CD / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/916715-fantail-vision/
Originally released on Soundcloud, you know the drill. This one was actually recorded before Mukomodulator and Mukogenerator. Mukotronics 1 contains many drone-like sounds and is supposed to be an undulating river, it is one guess? Some of the electronics sound like a bird. I would call Surge Vol. 1 another of these "noise wall" tracks, the description says "sandstorm-like sounds fill ... read more
FANTAIL VISION / 2nd CD / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/916715-fantail-vision/
Originally released in 2021 on Superpang, here we get one more track, different titles and a nicer cover. Another of these "noise wall" (NOT HNW, I just don't know how else to describe this) releases, there's bass thumping so that's nice? Contraption 1 started being a bit more interesting at the end, Petara 2020 has drones and something I could kinda call a rhythm. Pattern B ... read more
FANTAIL VISION / 1st CD / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/916715-fantail-vision/
Originally released on Merzbow's Soundcloud, this is the high quality version. Each part does something different: the first one throws all the noise on top of a drone, the second one has "beats" which get chopped, the third one has a drum loop, cool! Nice release, it could've done more though.
FANTAIL VISION | 6 of 6 | 59 | February 7th, 2025
One more box set and I'm done, I swear. Anyway, fantail pigeons!!!
Read also: https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/850793-new-ear-control/
Another box set from Slowdown Records, though this time it's not part of the Merzbow Archive Series (that one is finished). A mix of released and unreleased recordings from 2020-2022.
REVIEWS/RATINGS & CLOSING WORDS (THOSE DON'T EXIST YET) BELOW
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DISC 1 | Mukogenerator | 69 ... read more
NEW EAR CONTROL / 6th CD / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/850793-new-ear-control/
🙉 I'VE HEARD 180+ MERZBOW RELEASES IN THE LAST 3 MONTHS AMA. READ THE REVIEW FOR THE BOX SET PLEASE 🙉
And with this disc, I have officially finished the Merzbow Archive Series from Slowdown Records. 450Q is another effects pedal test run, but at least it's shorter than Noise 5706 and more interesting. Pulsing drones everywhere, distorted piano on Part 2, you know, there's ... read more
NEW EAR CONTROL / 5th CD / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/850793-new-ear-control/
A test run from Merz for new effects pedals (it isn't mentioned which ones, sadly). If that wasn't mentioned in the description for this I wouldn't even think it's a test run, it basically sounds like average Merz noise.
NEW EAR CONTROL / 4th CD / https://www.albumoftheyear.org/user/chtc/album/850793-new-ear-control/
A rehearsal recording for a live performance, Merz is testing out several patterns here. For something like this, it's okay, I've heard better rehearsals from Masami in this series. I assume the live show itself was much better.
The second track, Slug Soundcheck, does kinda bang near the end, so that's cool.
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Recent Review Comments
On TheVULover's review of Whitehouse - Bird Seed
"@TheVULover ah of course he has a vid of him talking about it for 20 minutes. i was planning to listen to the noisextra interview(s) but i guess i'll have to watch this too, cheers"
On TheVULover's review of Whitehouse - Bird Seed
"is he really allat for people to still make music with him"
On TheVULover's review of Whitehouse - Bird Seed
"@TheVULover i need to watch/listen to an interview with duncan, need to know if he's as annoying as in those liners"
On TheVULover's review of Whitehouse - Bird Seed
"@TheVULover I mean I like Willy Bennett very much but some critique existing in the back of the head doesn't hurt innit"
On TheVULover's review of Whitehouse - Bird Seed
"@ScottShelby shitty postmortem zappa albums are basically necrophilia"
On The Gerogerigegege - 燃えない灰 [Moenai Hai]
"hah, sex number. looks like now i'm fighting with god himself"
On TheVULover's review of Whitehouse - Bird Seed
"He still seems happy to meet corpsefucker Duncan! I don't care if he actually fucked that corpse or not, read the liners for Pleasure Escape, what an annoying twat. Fun how a nice bit of the scene seems to be cool with him!"
On TheVULover's review of Whitehouse - Bird Seed
"The Sotos dissing on Asceticists 2006 cuts for sure, but how seriously can you take it when one half is still on good terms with the person being dissed, and the problem the other half has could be something else than Sotos' "noncery""
On TheVULover's review of Whitehouse - Bird Seed
"In this thread Bennett first posts an excerpt from an interview where they say some kind words about Sotos, he only later talks shit about the guy.
https://susanlawly.proboards.com/thread/668/obvious-sotos-question"
On TheVULover's review of Whitehouse - Bird Seed
"Can you really love Bennett if you hate Sotos? He worked with him since the mid-80s, it's not like he didn't know about the arrest. Even after they kicked him out they still put the collage on this album and played it live. Best still seems to be on good terms with him, released a few books of his too. Bennett either had some kind of enlightment, or they had a personal falling out caused by something else."
On Ꝙ𑢸ᶒͤᥢ 𝜎𐍆 ᗪⱸƞՊдꓤ𐔘's review of Merzbow - Berlin Atonal 2025
"i assume they wanted to have like a sampler on the digital release and make side a and b not playable until you buy them but didn't lol"
On The Gerogerigegege - 新宿に命さびしむ歌多し [Shinjuku ni inochi sabi shimu uta ōshi]
"@hwitehouse thanks!"
On Plookeduah's review of Ground-Zero - Consume Red
"@Plookeduah still straighter than these AOTY TOURIST LIBTARDS ヽ(*・ω・)ﾉ"
On Plookeduah's review of Ground-Zero - Consume Red
"@ScottShelby it's okay scotty, we all make mistakes sometimes (⊃｡•́‿•̀｡)⊃"
On Plookeduah's review of Ground-Zero - Consume Red
"otomo also has this Memory Disorder series, yeah good luck finding all of that"
On Plookeduah's review of Ground-Zero - Consume Red
"@ScottShelby i didn't say they were anything like the night before the death of the sampling virus, just that this is an extension of project (￢_￢;)"
On Plookeduah's review of Ground-Zero - Consume Red
"everyone loving this album is a tourist because they didn't listen to the two remix albums ( ꩜ ᯅ ꩜;) "
On TheVULover's review of The Gerogerigegege - 昭和 [Showa]
"Anyone know a version of the sex tape that sounds a lot like the version on here in the middle? Like, one without 2 minutes of Kimigayo attached at the ends of it?"
On goodUsern8m's review of Obywatel G.C. - Obywatel G.C.
"i need to tap into my own countrys music fr"
On Amenonuvoco - Fafrotskies
"@ScottShelby cheers"
On Scott Shelby's review of The Mothers of Invention - 1968 10 03 - Tivoli Gardens, Copenhagen, Denmark
"@ScottShelby sorry, i thought it was affectionate"
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