Veterans of the late eighties/early nineties vanguard of underground and experimental branches of Industrial that are still working today have seen a rapid pace in the advancement of tools for crafting electronic music. Those who have adapted have no doubt kept a spirit of exploration alive within them and those they inspire. From my experience, there is a select group that illustrates this principle in the best light, and that is the Italians that generation saw. This scene has always been very unique in sound, but also in style. Italian Industrial has for the most part been a wealth of atmosphere, soundscapes, and all manor of unknown timbre. After the last twenty years, there remain artists who have kept the old-school approach, as well as having kept the keen eye toward the future they had since youth.
Corrado Altieri and Simon Balestrazzi are among these veterans, and they are as strong as ever, proving such with material like that contained in < Rings >. The name of the project is after one of the larger canyons on the Martian surface, and if you already knew this, one can infer that the material presented could be inspired by the Cosmos. Many of us are, from time to time, it comes with the territory when you go between Osc this and ADSR that, sounds that we would like to imagine as outer-worldly just come forth. Altieri, of Uncodified and Monosonik fame, and Balestrazzi of Dream Weapon Ritual are a new pair, but their combined experience has brought us something less dark than it is intriguing, but having just enough of a space-color to carry everything that is a blinding beacon of activity. Most of the few but highly substantial tracks given make unexpected transitions.
The blend of purist analog tones and lingering occurrences of more stinging power electronics is superb. From start to finish, this album gives you not only the aforementioned duo of sound styles, but also textures that feel contemporary, or at the very least, uncommon. Though “uncommon” is still a great trait to hold. “The Third Void” is something of a cross between Mz.412 and Atrax Morgue, the bigger influence seeming to be the latter. Frequencies that border on the uncomfortable side are evident on “Hallucination Doors” and “Chemical Analysis Of Ectoplasm”. “Apophenia”, the finale, is like a story within a story, moving from moods ranging from soothing, to droning and having an eventual build to a fascinating disorder of sorts. Highly impressive throughout, this one. I cant help but think that perhaps, if Marco Corbelli was not so death-obsessed in his lifetime, he might have ended up creating something like < Rings >
Label: Old Europa Cafe / Format: CD / Cat. # OECD 152
Rating: 4/5
Written by: Rexington Steel
Tracklisting:
01 Inside The Ether At 06:00 A.M.
02 The Third Void
03 Chemical Analysis Of Ectoplasm
04 Hallucination Doors
05 Apophenia
