French goth rock band CorpusDelicti, were pretty big in the 90s, and after several acclaimed albums, they kind of disappeared. In 2022, the band reformed and with the release of the single “Chaos,” in 2024, it was plain to see that they had not lost any of that magic. Their fan base in Mexico is huge and so in April, 2023, they played Mexico City, recording the whole thing in order to release the live album From Dust To Light.
PHOTO BY LOIC SWINY
What really hits you is the quality of the recording. So absolutely crisp and clear, with Pietrapiana’s vocals never swallowed by the music and the guitars that Delicti are famous for clean in the mix, so a shout out to the guys mixing this in the form of TéoSarfati and FranckAmendola. . Even the drums are beautifully picked up and this album is a joy to hear. I found myself singing along with “Saraband,” “Lorelei” and “Patient,” wishing I was at this live event and yet mesmerised by how good these tracks are live and that they are as fresh as they were thirty years ago.
It is a privilege to hear SébastienPietrapiana (vocals), FranckAmendola (guitar), ChristopheBaudrion (Bass) and LaurentTamagno (drums) playing classic tracks drawn from across four epic albums. The band are incredibly talent musicians and there is just something magical about hearing songs played that are not hinged on backing tracks. Everything rests solely on the shoulders of players and Corpus Delicti are pure class. From Dust To Light is a wander down memory lane… another place and another time, with songs that are timeless and I have to say, I am so happy Corpus Delicti are back.
DirtFactory are a pretty industrial lot, literally, bringing out their fourth album in just as many years, on the ViralRecords label in Australia. Brothers MichaelGillman and DanielAllen have brought forth the plague in the form of DyingPlanet, that has been mastered at AbeliskAudio by the HOSTILEARCHITECT himself, MitchKenny.
Callum Dodds from RAZRWHP is on guitar duty for the first track “Destroy It All,” bringing the grating metallic taste, as well as finesse, while the lads truly are upping the ante with an electronic onslaught. “Bones” is the single and the dance of the dead goes hard, laying bare the futility of flesh and belief for everything is going to become dust. We are now in the “Houses of Worship” and there is a palpable 80s feel to the music and Allen’s vocals only add to the disillusionment in commercial religion.
We are going to be visited by the siren called Brianna Smith, the lead singer of RAZRWHP and there is no disappointment here, with her delicate vocals in direct contrast to Daniel’s almost spoken word. She is the angel of death while he is the disease in the title track “Dying Planet.” It could be said that “IndustrialJesus” is a form of worship of KMFDM and NitzerEbb, irreverent and damning of broken religious systems and in that vein is the rather catchy “Antipope,” with it’s rapid fire electronic beats and a fantastic use of vocals.
Does “Mod Matrix” mean modified matrix? A throwback perhaps to the movie The Matrix and how you could download anything you wanted to learn straight into your brain…but then do you know what is real and what is not and the music does not spark any kind of hope for a good ending. “The Body is Dead” has this very cool rhythm that instantly grabs your attention, while the synths climb and fall in tale of cybernetics gone wrong. The calm before the “NuclearStrike,” as the track slowly builds towards midnight and ultimate fallout, taking out you out with extreme prejudice. Track ten is the last and it is the menacingly named and airless “Coathanger.” Why airless? The song has the atmosphere of smothering with its oppressiveness.
This, for me, is the best vocal outing for Daniel, as he seems to be settling more into the role and having guest musicians is a nice addition. I have to say I really enjoyed “TheBodyIs Dead” and my top choice would have to be the collaboration with Brianna on “DyingPlanet.” I already know the lads are already creating more music, and watch this space for a new project from Michael. All is doom and a Dying Planet from Dirt Factory.
Hisham Zreiq is a Palestinian visual artist and film maker living in Germany. He is also an electronic musician and the Goddess Asherah Project is his outlet of experimenting with ambient soundscapes which in essence could be a soundtrack for one of his movies. August has seen the release of the album The land of Joy, which contains thirteen instrumental tracks.
The album is full of light with its chimes, oriental styled sounds and rhythms. It flows with the titles fitting so well and the feel of each track is conveyed through the music. “Delight” invokes a taste of India and it truly is a delight to listen to, while “Frisky” has playful bleeps that run at a whirlwind pace. The land of Joy should be listened to when you want to unwind or need to be taken away to a place where you can be free to dream. The Canaanite GoddessAsherah has the power to grant you joy in the electronic world.
RobertBenaquista brings you Cucurbitophobia, the project so grim, it is named after the fear of pumpkins, and after sowing the seeds, he has reaped the new album called IV. Cucurbitophobia is a darksynth/neo-classical project hailing from New Jersey.
You have entered the time of nightmares where nothing seems real and all is covered in a pall of dusky sorrow. The fires burn cold in this hellish wasteland that is “IgnisSatanae,” dragging you into the shadow realm. “GaleofLucifer” is the quiet before the oncoming storm, an entourage of building anticipation of dark angelic release, ticking like a timebomb, never getting any faster, as if your doom means nothing in the whole scheme of things. The solo guitar sets your teeth on edge in opposition to the piano. You are now on the “SoilofBelial,” and the devil is going to welcome you. From within the cacophony, if you listen carefully enough, you might hear the voices of lost souls wailing in the distance.
Like something from BlackSabbath, the guitar holds sway, the creator of organised chaos and then, yet, there are periods of reflective electronic dismay, distant and disconcerting. You shouldn’t be here and the tension rises for whatever is in the dark is baying for your blood. The creature in the “Bay of Leviathan: Chapter I” calls out from the deep and it almost feels like sanctuary, a ray of light in the gloom. The piano takes its place, making you feel most uneasy, rippling through the surrounds, and into the murky unknown. Unlike the previous track, “Bay of Leviathan: Chapter II” starts so differently, tasting of gentle breezes and fingers of sunshine breaking through to the shimmer water’s surface….though is it almost a lament in a way, the piano plinks in a sporadic wandering, modern avant-garde style. Final track “Memento Vivere” continues in this vein, conjuring shadows of memories along with raising the ghosts of what is lost.
If you haven’t quite caught the drift yet, Cucurbitophobia is very much entrenched in the horror genre. Music that imprints on your psyche and tugs at your base human instincts that recognises fear and aberration. Why is the album called IV? It isn’t the fourth album. Curiosity abounds. Benaquista has said that the inspiration is from John Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” a poem about the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden… a loss of innocence that can never be regained and the full realisation that what we do not know terrifies us, captured in a mirror like reflection by Cucurbitophobia.
Did you know that Geishas Of Doom (GOD) are a six piece punk band from the Netherlands? Me neither!! Punk has a happy little place in my heart, especially as it lent itself to the post-punk movement with its experimental stance and do it yourself ethos. May has the release of the album TheFirstFourTapes, which has a huge twenty four tracks, though in true punk form, most run under two minutes.
From the first track, ‘(Here Comes The) Snakestorm,” you get a taste for what this band is going for in sound. It is purposefully lo-fi in quality, giving it a raw edge that makes it feel like a live performance. The drums a loud and brash, getting a good workout every track, and pretty much, it is the guitars versus vocals that are the stars. However, you do occasionally catch the odd, possibly synth noise blip in the mix.
I think the track “Avoid The Fall” absolutely grabbed my attention with the classic post-punk guitar work in opposition to the screaming vocals, and it is a cracking song. Talking of cracks, there is the song “Crack” which is not about the drugs, but rather a split in the wall, which rather reminded me of the theme running through the Matt Smith era of Dr Who. Fans? “Pulse” is just another reason to really like these guys as it shows a different facet of their writing talent. So good.
You can hear a plethora of influences such as metal, prog rock, gothic rock, grunge, rockabilly and shoegaze, which makes the album a musical joy, as GeishasOfDoom fuse what makes them passionate, into a wonderful punk album with real soul. And honestly, who doesn’t like a band that sticks two fingers in the air and makes their initials GOD. Genius.
Now here is a conundrum…. Washington based project Zabus has dropped two albums within three months of each…this year. Soooo, I have decided to showcase the latest release, The Future Of Death, which is out on the non-profit label SaccharineUnderground. JeremyMoore (Thee Rise Ov Sadistic Youth, Zero Swann, Garozde) started Zabus in 2023, joined by fellow musicians Peter Hallock (Garozde), AlkaneShimizu (ZeroSwann) and, for this album, JeroenAchterburg. By the way, is it just me or is the cover channelling NewOrder’sMovement?
From the get go, there is the jangly guitar with reflective echoing and sweetly morose vocals. The guitars do not seem to want to follow the script as evidenced in “Columbarium” where they go from Southern Gothic plucking to wandering through the track, all the while the electronics blow through in the background. “Subversion” is in the territory of causing your skin to gooseflesh with its haunting simplicity, slowly tracing ephemeral fingers, raising ghosts of 80s British post-punk bands in their wake.
Necro means death and graphs are a pictorial way of representing data, so possibly the track “Necrographs” is about wanting an organised knowledge of what happens after the last breath has left the body. The ability to quantify the final moments and beyond if there is one, “Necrographs” eerily drones with rhythmic oddities holding it together, while the synths wend their way, with the occasional instrumental scream into the void.
The drawling “Captor” leads you down a road of torment of when lovers no longer feel that pull and yet cannot leave, maybe due to fear. The heavy bass is beautiful in “Retribution,” married to the fabulous striking guitars and clicking beats. Honestly, the guitars are the feature of this track and I really adored it. We are thrown into the far more experimental and psychedelic “The All Light,” filled with reverb and distortion, and I can’t help but smile as it reminds me of Bauhaus in some ways. There is also some pretty intense imagery within the lyrics.
There is that Southern Gothic feel again in “BurstOppression,” and it is eloquent in both tone and vocal imagery, with a true sense of loss and complete hopelessness, dropping us in an expansive desert of mortality. Last track is “Solstice,” and it is poignant and dark. Perhaps it is looking back to a point in history where life was given so that life could continue, in the form of sacrifice or mayhap star crossed lovers, but it lets your imagination run wild with the possibilities.
Moore’s vocals are very reminiscent of IanAstbury and are a delight to behold. For me, this is the essence of gothic/post-punk music. There are the tried and true expressions of the style from the guitar flourishes, introspective lyrics, brooding vocals and looking through a romanticised lens, a vision of dark beauty encompassing life, death and spirituality. However there is also an experimental pushing of the boundaries, asking instruments to make sounds that they are not necessarily meant to make and not sticking to set musical formulae, which makes Zabus just that little more exciting. Both “The Future Of Death” and “TopographyOfIconoclast” are really worth treating your ears with, so you might savour the intricacies of weaving more traditional gothic, with something I would equate in the region of when you first hear EinstürzendeNeubauten and it just blows your mind.
Since the late 1990s, JiJianhong has been a much vaunted musician of the experimental crowd, especially expressing himself through live recordings, a reflection of his home town Fenghua, in China. Melbourne independent based label, RambleRecords has released SoulSolitary, a two track album which runs for nearly forty-five minutes.
Blasts of chords greet your ears before the free form jazz infused rock guitar leaps forward, sometimes with great vigour causing vocal outbursts. The wave after wave of sound assaults your senses, vibrating and prolonged chords hang in the air searing your brain before becoming a monastic chant, timeless and floating. “SolitaryMan” goes from attacking to eerily haunting, with Jianhong the resident ghost heralded by what could be described as Tibetan long horns, yet this is still his guitar. There are moments of listening to the wind that suddenly disintegrate into a maelstrom of noise.
The feedback In “Waterfall” is immense and impressive, stretching forth like a hand searching into the world, and finding thorns and open spaces. Lakes of placid water with creatures below dart around, in their own sphere of existence where the noises from realm filter down muffled and inconsequential. And all the while the waterfall churns the water, oblivious to everything else around it.
What was Li Jianhong thinking about when he recorded these?…well unless you ask the man, then we will never know and I guess this is a part of experimental music. It is mean to provoke and everything is up for interpretation. It is a journey you take with the creator and Solitary Man is engrossing.
The label Cioran Records, has released the experimental album Les Couleurs d’une Fièvre, by French group Flagorne. Maquerelle (vocals, lyrics, synthesizers, samplers) and Afga06l (additional voices, computer, digital instruments) make up the group which combines industrial noise with black metal.
And so the decent into Hell begins with “Salutations,” brutally assaulting your ears. Salut à vous! or hello to everyone, though this welcome is full of bad tidings for the listener. Drawn taut and extruded, the music and vocals speak of pain before there is a pause, when the voice expresses how all this is a fever dream in the aftermath of a holocaust. Candaule(s), a king of Lydia in the 7th century BC, was mentioned by Herodotus as a ruler of great depravity, and in the track “Adresses,” the line ‘On sera Candaule de tout un empire/We will be Candaule of an entire empire,’ hints at wonton wickedness. The music is spurred on by an explosive rhythmic momentum, swirling in its majestic inferno.
From the depths you can hear the shaman of a bygone era chanting their ritual in “Dévore,” before the electronic clicks and clanks kick in with the vehement whispers and discontented screams, that retreat and flood forth again, which is understandable when one is being devoured. The rise of empires also brings about destruction and this is the angst of “De rien de bien,” where you can almost feel the blood pumping freely from wounds of the tortured souls, as the mechanised world continues to smash on without any emotion. The final track is “Comme plusieurs,” that begins subtly, as I strain my ears to adjust to the bleeping programming, until the vocals take us by surprise, like a call to prayers through a megaphone, and there is a gravity to the austere tone. Maybe a judgement.
Les Couleurs d’une Fièvre basically translates to The Colours of a Fever, and indeed the album does feel like a delirious nightmare, visceral and haunting, as if you were unfortunate enough to enter the circles of hell and yet you know that this is all earth bound. And maybe that is the crux of it all, that man makes his own hell on earth. Flagorne will not disappoint.
For those that remember the 80s, or are connoisseurs of goth/post-punk music of that period might be familiar with the band Siiiii, a UK band that sprung onto the scene from 83-86, with PaulDevine as the lead singer. Devine released his debut solo album called We Are The Compass Rose, the beginning of 2023 (you can read the MichelRowland review here —-> https://onyxmusicreviews.com/2023/02/26/paul-devine-we-are-the-compass-rose/) and in October, he dropped a second album, titled ADHD.
You know when the first instrument you hear is a deep, rolling bass, that you are in for something rather exciting, and so we are plunged into the punk affair that is “Leader ofthe Free World.” With the snarled vocals and grating guitar, it is a sneering two fingers in the air with contempt. “TheTardigradeSong” is dedicated to the micro animal who is also known as the moss piglet or water bear. One may ask what is so impressive about these creatures until you realise that they are near indestructible and in that light, the track conga lines, engaging with indifference of the humans, as the tardigrade will be here long after you are gone. The sawing guitars squeal and reverberate, collapsing into charming wistful chiming, over and over again in “RememberedVoices.” Everything is delicately layered into a powerful wall of noise with Devine’s poetic prose stirring the ghosts of yesteryears.
They say youth is wasted on the young, but also that time flies fast for a mortal soul and this feels true of “She Was Married in June,” a delicate track, with beautiful instrumentation with the air of an olde lament. The tragedy of a life so fleeting while the natural world continues without noticing the loss. “Dulle Griet” (Dull Gret) also known as Mad Meg, was a female of Flemish legend, who supposedly led an army of women into the Mouth of Hell to plunder. Peter Bruegel the Elder immortalised her in his painting of the same name, and there is debate as to whether the artwork depicts Meg as a shrew or a woman brave enough to face her own demons. And true to form, this track is a harsh descent into the madness that is the painting, portraying a lady who will broker a world created by men no more, stalking the Devil, before setting her intent on destroying God. RebeccaAntrim is responsible for the vocals of DulleGriet and they are wonderfully cutting, where you can feel in your bones her aggrievement.
There is a surreal presence in “Stillness,” a sinuous calm before the storm, the focus being between Devine’s vocals and the soaring guitar, foreboding and at odds with itself. I love the juxtaposition of punk music married to lyrics written in a much older form of English in “Mary’sAle.” Both bewitching and modern, using the English language as ornamentation and gilding the track in golden hues. The jauntily joyous feeling “One Skin for Another,” tinkles with guitar shoegaze swirls and couldn’t be much further in difference to “The Song of Just Because.” With its southern twang and Cool Hand Luke style vocals, you can imagine sitting on the open plains in twilight, though nothing is so simple. “O Happy Day” holds the promise of a 50s do-wop for the damned, and yet there is a sweet reminder that maybe, in the end, we should just enjoy the each day as it comes. The last track “Leaf” is an ephemeral piece, immersed in a classical fashion, a spoken word experimental tale that captures your imagination with its sorrowed sweetness.
For those wondering why the album is called ADHD, this is because the musician behind it all, is neurodivergent. PaulDevine recorded all these songs in one take, no practice runs with the other musicians, and it really is a tribute to the craftmanship of the tracks, as well as all the contributing talents. Each track feels fully formed and gloriously intricate, exploring the depths of Hell, the brevity of life, love and even celebrating the smallest creatures most people have no idea exist. ADHD is a plethora of styles held together with dark romanticism and is a modern classic.
Leeds goth rock band, ZeitgeistZero, released their debut self titled album back in 2005, and since then have dropped albums very regularly. 2023 brought forth the current offering of Meddling With The Forces for this trio on the label Bat-Core. Mixing was conducted by CorinZero and StevenWhitfield (TheCure), while the mastering is by TimHay at AutumnGiantMastering and the whole shebang recorded at InnerSanctumStudios.
Initial track, “Go To Hell” sets up the mystical stage, and what you are in for with ZeitgeistZero. It is a mixture of swirling darkwave electronics, with powerful female vocals and a heavy dose of dance rhythms. With hints of InkubusSukkubus, it is time to “Set The Monster Free” with dashes of grinding guitar and sparkling synths, before we are faced with the far more rock heavy “Satanic Sex Witch,” that echoes and reverberates as she stalks you with a very pleasant ending. If a sex witch is your undoing, then at least you can stay in touch with a “Séance,” which might be more fun than using a mobile phone and is a spooky cute proposition from the band. None of this is possible however, without tapping into one’s “Psyche.” This is a much slower track, revelling between the sheets of ether world, floating through.
There is something quite delightful in the slightly chaotic disjointedness of “NightPeople,” as it is almost teeters on industrial ground both musically and for repressed aggression. Those children of the night is what we are all about. Continuing on the harsher side of electronics, the beginning of “Scream” greets your ears with grating noise, before rocking you with the outbursts of guitar and lulls of anticipation. The single “ToxicTwist” is designed to whip you up with its punk attitude and play between synths and guitar, about a relationship with a less than desirable toxic human. “PlasticDiamonds” look flashy but are worth nothing and the same can be said for people who act like fake jewels, where not everything that glitters is worthy, unlike this song. Final track is the lower, slower and heavier “TheUnwantedOne,” that smacks slightly of ConcreteBlonde.
ZeitgeistZero might be MeddlingWithTheForces, but you know this is not the first time they have travelled this gothic road. They are accomplished musicians with a back catalogue that I would highly suggest you check out. The album is full of ghoulish delights, whether they be musical textures or supernatural subjects. Witches, monsters and goths…oh my.
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