PREVIEW: Outer Church - Psychedelic Campfire Tales (Thursday, 13th January)

Thursday 13th January

Komedia Brighton

7pm

£4 on the portal

The Outer Church lurches into 2011 with what promises to be a truly immersive audiovisual experience.

The OC is proud to present two films by American director Graham Reznick in association with Aphasia Films/Glass Eye Pix. I Can See You (95 minutes) is a psychedelic campfire tale acclaimed by The New York Times as an “elusive, experimental scare flick [heralding] a splendid new filmmaker with one eye on genre mechanics, one eye on avant-garde conceits and a third eye for transcendental weirdness” while futuristic 3D short The Viewer (15 minutes) is “a telepathic interrogation experienced from the perspective of a suspected murderer.” Anaglyph glasses will be provided for the latter screening.

The uncanny atmosphere will be further compounded by live sets from The Haxan Cloak and The Larsen Effect.  The Haxan Cloak is multi-instrumentalist Bobby Krlic, who employs a variety of textures to erect dense scuttling fields of sonic malevolence and has released records on Aurora Borealis - a label that houses several otherworldy metal/noise/ambient crossover illuminati like Burial Hex, Zola Jesus and Wraiths. 

Here's a real short blast of a video that drops you right into the headspace, albeit in a harsh full light:

The Larsen Effect is the solo project (and first ever live outing in this incarnation) for guitarist Leee Nite, veteran of the psychick wars and such esteemed outfits as Skree, Thor’s Helmet, ManTouch and Morgen Und Nite. Visuals for The Larsen Effect will be provided by acclaimed videowitch Jade Boyd.

Here's some taught electrical storm chasing from that Larsen Effect for you:

Turn up early or you WILL miss something!

STREAM: Heavy Winged - Sunspotted

Type Records have put up the two monlithic tracks that make up Heavy Winged's new 12" on their Soundcloud and you can stream them here. Heavy Winged are a sprawling North American trio made up of drummer Jed Bindeman, bassist Brady Sansone and guitarist Ryan Hebert, and easily one of my favourite ever bands - I've been hooked and a complete fan boy ever since I heard the first opening bars of Through The Shimmer, and I own ever single album they have ever released, which is about 30. A band to truly believe in.  This new record is like a full realisation of what they have been working towards, blurring the capabilities and definitions of bass and guitar, combinining that interaction with the punctuation and propulsion of the percussion creating a audible dialogue between the trio incorporating dynamic, momentum and sheer noise. So relentlessly intense it's psychedelic.


This, from Type:

Over the last few years the band have released a cacophonous splatter of cassettes, vinyl and cdrs for Not Not Fun, Blackest Rainbow, Aurora Borealis, Students of Decay, ThreeLobed and a handful of other esteemed imprints. Most of these have been mercilessly grimy signifiers of their buzzing free-rock style, and were recorded poorly to almost accentuate the harsh guitar tones and double-time blast beats. This latest jagged offering however is a rare beast in the Heavy Winged canon, offering a higher fidelity peek into their muddled world.

This time around the band escaped to a ‘real’ studio to record two slices of extended sludge rock, which come across as wider than ever thanks to some fresh recording techniques. Something like an unholy union between the sheet-noise of Yellow Swans and the blissful sub-harmonic transcendence of early Mogwai or Sonic Youth, Sunspotted is an album that takes tried and tested sounds and bends them beyond recognition. Sure plenty of bands have made distorted, blurred, guitar noise before, but rarely with the conviction and wit of Heavy Winged. With their early explorations into doom and metal we find the band on a high, framing their high-octane jitter into something that could almost be mistaken for beautiful. Just as the aforementioned Yellow Swans took their sound from the outer reaches of noise to something, dare I say it, pretty, Heavy Winged have focused their three individual powers to come up with an album that revels in its depth and shimmering beauty.

It might take a few listens to reveal its layers but Sunspotted is a challenging and rewarding listening experience. Standing at the top of the band’s already estimable catalogue of albums and EPs, this album finds them at a key moment, a moment where they have found a balance between fidelity and grit, harmony and discord. Step in, turn it up and let yourself descend.

Conan - Horseback Battle Hammer

Conan have been anointed the genre caveman battle doom. Primitive and crushingly heavy it is also pretty nimble when they want to be. They use quick changes in tempo like a killshot. Their album Horseback Battle Hammer is available on vinyl from Throne Records and CD through Aurora Borealis.

The album is one of the most riveting and exciting doom releases I've heard for some time with many majestic and arresting moments spread across the record; The whole vocal performance it's unique; it's always a long distant lonely cry echoing through the wilderness/across the battlefield; almost anguished but not piteously, almost Ozzy Sabbathesque but more mournful - a howl into the winds of the North. Maybe the best Doom vocal I have ever heard. Musically the tempo changes fuel the more euphoric moments; The switch up from crawl to canter in Satsumo, 3:25 into Dying Giant when the sludgy head nodding plod breaks into a even more catchy and densely grinding riff, on to a peak where the drums bludgeon along savagely, double kick coming in shortly after to drive the climax upwards. Then, just as you feel like you have heard all this bands tricks they drop a blitzed white out guitar scree around 8:30 into the final Sea Lord, cascading a sheer torrent of noise down off the speakers unexpectedly before intensifying relentlessly out to the finish. Inspired.

These three guys do the crushing:

Jon Davis - Guitar / Vocals
Paul O’Neill - Drums
John McNulty - Bass / Vocals

Here's a video of their first live show in January 2008, but youtube just won't do the weight of this band justice, you really have to go and get this for yourselves.

DOWNLOAD: Aurora Borealis Mix

One of our favourite record labels (if not our number 1 - we have the t-shirt after all), specialists in left-field experimental black/doom/drone metal Aurora Borealis have put out a free downloadable 'mixtape' for you. Just over 30 minutes of epic, intense and visceral sounds from their most recent releases. Here's the tracklist:

0:00 - 4:17 - Sylvester Anfang II - The Devil Always Shits In The Same Graves (Part 1) (Sylvester Anfang II)

4:17 - 9:35 - Ben Nash - Magnetophon 8 Pt IV (The Seventh Goodbye)

9:35 - 11:37 - Rye Wolves - Millions Of Gallons Of Water (Oceans Of Delicate Rain)

11:37 - 16:40 - Burial Hex - Throne (Split 7" With Sylvester Anfang II)

16:40 - 24:30 - Heavy Winged - Morning Flesh (Waking, Shaking)

24:30 - 30:09 - Wormsblood - Ritual Of Bone And Horn / A Houndish Child Arise (In The Stars)


Label man Andrew Hartwell says he is planning on doing one of these every month or so from now on which is a very exciting prospect for those not quite as fanatical about picking every rlrease from this label as soona s they put it out.

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DOWNLOAD