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LP
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TYPE 103LP
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There are dark forces at work deep in the deserts of New Mexico. William Fowler Collins has been hard at work since his last full-length effort, but collaborations with Gog and Aaron Turner (of Isis) haven't deterred him from crafting this pitch-black follow-up. The ingredients won't surprise fans of Perdition Hill Radio (TYPE 046CD/LP), but on The Resurrections Unseen, Collins further damages and buries his palette of sounds beyond all recognition. Howling field recordings are trapped between walls of tape hiss while white noise and twisted guitar suffers through overdub after overdub, leaving only the picked carcass of what was once a discernable sound. Much was made of its predecessor's deconstruction of black metal, but The Resurrections Unseen takes this to another level entirely. The album is, for all intents and purposes, a black metal record -- but any traces of blast beats, hoarse, blood-curdling vocals or shrill distorted guitar have been totally obliterated. What remains are bleak, windswept textures, spine-chilling rituals and the kind of doom-laden ambience that'll have you double-bolting your doors and checking your phone lines. This is not theater though; Collins never resorts to the typical horror tropes, instead opting to suggest fear with the most restrained hand. As rolling hiss emerges from a muddy puddle of dank sub bass, it might take a few listens to pick out exactly what you're hearing at all, but the terror is there from the very beginning. Many artists attempt dark music, but few really succeed -- Collins has managed it by merely suggesting what our brains already know. A frightening thought, indeed. Cut at Dubplates & Mastering, limited to 500 copies only.
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2LP
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TYPE 046LP
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2LP version, contains an extra 20+ minute bonus track not on the CD. From the desolate hills of Albuquerque, New Mexico comes self-styled black ambient guitar overlord William Fowler Collins, and his second full-length release, Perdition Hill Radio. Brought up in New England and educated in San Francisco, the constant traveling has given his music a rare patience and focus and a distinct connection with the sprawling American landscape. Like Earth's seminal Hex before it, Perdition Hill Radio invokes the ghosts of a lost America and drags the rotting carcass of country music through a swamp of noise and drone. With a love of both experimental ambient music and ear-splitting black metal, Collins has arrived upon a grim hybrid of both. Black ambient might be the best description, as this is neither one nor the other, inhabiting a lonely space in-between. The chugging, blown-out treble and isolated darkness of Xasthur is all present and correct, but there are also echoes of William Basinski and Deaf Center hidden amongst the clouds of radio static. These rare cracks of beauty are what make Perdition Hill Radio such an arresting listening experience, and what sets it apart from so much that has come before. There is a shadowy link between the compositions of William Fowler Collins and fellow Type artists Svarte Greiner and Xela; all three share a similar fascination with the darker side of the ambient spectrum. Collins, however, manages to re-frame this darkness to suit the sun-baked mountain tops of New Mexico, and it's all the bleaker for it. As crows circle an anonymous skeleton and brightly-colored lizards retreat into their dark corners, there could be no better soundtrack than this. Dark, doomy and with no escape from the pounding sun up above, Perdition Hill Radio is a truly cinematic record.
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CD
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TYPE 046CD
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From the desolate hills of Albuquerque, New Mexico comes self-styled black ambient guitar overlord William Fowler Collins, and his second full-length release, Perdition Hill Radio. Brought up in New England and educated in San Francisco, the constant traveling has given his music a rare patience and focus and a distinct connection with the sprawling American landscape. Like Earth's seminal Hex before it, Perdition Hill Radio invokes the ghosts of a lost America and drags the rotting carcass of country music through a swamp of noise and drone. With a love of both experimental ambient music and ear-splitting black metal, Collins has arrived upon a grim hybrid of both. Black ambient might be the best description, as this is neither one nor the other, inhabiting a lonely space in-between. The chugging, blown-out treble and isolated darkness of Xasthur is all present and correct, but there are also echoes of William Basinski and Deaf Center hidden amongst the clouds of radio static. These rare cracks of beauty are what make Perdition Hill Radio such an arresting listening experience, and what sets it apart from so much that has come before. There is a shadowy link between the compositions of William Fowler Collins and fellow Type artists Svarte Greiner and Xela; all three share a similar fascination with the darker side of the ambient spectrum. Collins, however, manages to re-frame this darkness to suit the sun-baked mountain tops of New Mexico, and it's all the bleaker for it. As crows circle an anonymous skeleton and brightly-colored lizards retreat into their dark corners, there could be no better soundtrack than this. Dark, doomy and with no escape from the pounding sun up above, Perdition Hill Radio is a truly cinematic record.
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