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Degeneral
CD-R (ltd. 223) |
Degeneral was formed in the Siberian city of Kemerovo in 2001 and has already recorded several albums none of which has been issued to present day, so "After the World" can be called the first official release of the project. The album sounds like a soundtrack to a mental trip through the lifeless spaces of the world outlived electro-mechanical apocalypse. First monotonous droning tracks unobtrusively bring listener's perception into a laid-back and meditative state. But the sound gradually condenses, saturation of sonic events grows and music takes mechanical features of sinister atmosphere of a desolated factory working for hundreds of years without human assistance. Thunder of workshops, buzz of power substations and clanks of unknown mechanisms flow together into united psy-noise symphony. By the end of the disc anthropomorphical assotiations naturally pale and give way to abstract cosmic visions, provoked by skilfully combined avalanche-like noise waves and looped melodic lines.
The release is packed into hand-made outer sleeve made of foil-covered material with sprayed symbol and inner semi-transparent cardboard sleeve with information notes.
Reviews
/.../ A potential soundtrack to frozen lunar colonies, their autonomous machines and the desolate surroundings. Monotonous and truely ambient moments are to be found here along with thunderous saturated electrical discharges.
Degeneral, eine Industrial Formation aus Russland liefern mit "After the World" zu erst einmal ein optisches Highlight ab. Die CD-r präsentiert sich in einer silbernen Schaumstoffhülle, auf der sich ein Abgewandeltes Ying und Yang Muster befindet. Persönlich finde ich diese Idee sehr schick und passt sogar noch in jedes normale CD Regal. Der Einzige Nachteil ist das die Innenhülle, die aus einer durchsichtigen Folie ist und noch mal mit einem Logo und der Limitierungsnummer bedruckt ist, sehr scharfkantig ist und die Außenhülle sehr leicht beschadigt. Daher ist Vorsicht beim entnehmen der CD-r angebracht.
Musikalisch würde ich es in die Dark Ambient Ecke einordnen, auch wenn viele Klangelemente sehr an Death Industrial Musik erinnern. Das Album ist eher ruhig, doch oft bemerkt man allerdings einen sehr schleppenden Aufbau der Lieder, welcher nach meinen Geschmack gar nicht so stark ausgeprägt sein müsste. Insgesamt finde ich die sphärischen Stücke besser, wobei das sicher eine reine Geschmackssache ist. Technisch wurde das Werk sehr gut umgesetzt.
“Degeneral” is for sure the first Siberian band (formed in the city of Kemerovo in 2001) that I ever listened to. Though they did make some albums previously, this is their first ever official release. The album “After the world” was released on the Russian underground label “Zhelozobeton”.
If “Biosphere” showed us years ago what the North Pole sounded like from a natural beauty point of view, these guys show us the despair of Siberia, the mental state of depression of people living under extreme conditions. If it is not their intent to portrait Siberian life, then at least they produced the definitive soundtrack to the movie “The Day After”. This is how life sounds the day after a nuclear strike. It is also the soundtrack to a world ruled by machines and industrial devices, our contemporary world of mass-production, mass-pollution and dissolution of the interpersonal relations. The disembodiment of mankind has been turned into sound ! The tracks on this CD are untitled and this does not matter as the CD is an integral symphony of human decay and automated continuation. The first tracks numb your mind as droning sounds take the listener into a slightly darkened state-of-mind. Once this trance has been induced the sound picks up more intense fluctuations and increases in density gradually. Machines hum, drones work, things break, metal collides… You hear industrial sites, you smell the fumes and you can see the dirt. The environment is obscured by clouds of dense black smog. Machines move around like millions of ants, mechanically and instinctively (programmed or instinctively, what’s the difference ? ) proceeding their task with a sense of perfection.
This CD is a great symphony of electronic devices full of LFO, envelopes, decay, Arpeggio’s, sequenced bits and bytes, filters and pitch bended distorted bleeps. So if you love dark ambient, industrial soundscapes and synthesized experiments then this is one of those CD’s that can make a difference in your personal collection. And on top, all releases by this label are small-run prints in great packaging. A bit like ‘Muslimgauze’ for example.
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