Black Earth, Red Lights and a Saxophone

Album: Black Earth
Artist: Bohren and Der Club of Gore
Genre: Noir Jazz/Dark Ambient
Year: 2002
Label: Ipecac/Wonder

I’ve always had a fondness for David Lynch movies. The atmosphere, the cinematography and the bizarre and often deranged characters are all things I’ve deeply enjoyed. I especially enjoy the soundtracks. The music Lynch and his frequent collaborator Angelo Badalamenti compose for the films are always spot on in its mood, tone and overall sound. It’s probably for this reason that I like Bohren and Der Club of Gore so much. Listening is like being transported into a Lynch film, a dark and highly surreal experience. Bohren and Der Club of Gore sounds like Lynch’s dream Jazz band as it is ambient, filled with tension and gloomy beyond reason. It like staring into a dark void, an empty vista of nothing stretching out before you, then, from out of the void comes the sound, familiar, yet alien. The sound is the Noir Jazz that Bohren and his Club specialize in. It’s haunting and beautiful and unlike anything you’ve heard before. The tracks are long, many reaching and exceeding the 8 minute mark. But these are long pieces that need time to develop fully. The drums and bass are played by the most patient men in the world, their minimal sounds providing a foundation for the other sounds to build on.

Another piece of this foundation is the Dark Ambient samples that the band performs over. It is the combination of these Jazz and Dark Ambient that gives the music its unique sound. The most distinctive elements though, are the keyboards and saxophone. Jazzy, yet lilting, familiar, yet strange and dark, very, very dark. These men are not musicians but rather dark warlocks who work their arts through musical instruments rather then spell books. It is a sparse sound but a deep one none the less. As there are no words, the stories conveyed in the music are in the titles. These titles included pieces like “Midnight Black Earth,” Vigilante Crusade” and “Constant Fear.” This is music to be listened to late at night, with the curtains drawn and all the lights (except the red ones) out. The clubs this band plays in must be spooky places to be in. Though, I cannot think of anything more Lynchian then a club haunted by the sounds of Bohren and Der Club of Gore. This is for anyone who enjoys David Lynch’s films or music, Lustmord or Noir Jazz. Be afraid; be very afraid of the dark.

Obtain This!

Album: Obtainium
Artist: Skeleton Key
Genre: Experimental Rock
Year: 2002
Label: Ipecac

Eric Sanko, former bass player for the Lounge Lizards, leads the bizarre and eccentric Skeleton Key. Equal parts Primus, Tom Waits and Einsturzende Neubauten, Skeleton Key sounds like a junk yard crew would if they formed a band. The appeal of the group is its unique sound, which they achieve by way of ancient microphones, old guitars and junky percussion. The sound is actually fairly funky, all things considered. Sanko has been doing the music thing for a long time and knows how to play his instrument. The whole band is skilled and you’d have to be to follow Sanko’s eccentricities to the letter. The guitar sounds like it comes from archaic speakers and during some of the more blistering solos has a tendency to cut in and out, but it works to add to the atmosphere of the music.

The percussion is the real draw though. The drum set sounded like it was cobbled together from scrap metal and it probably was. Junky and cacophonous, it batters its way around the stage, knocking into absolutely everything. To see the band live must be something. Individual standouts are tracks like “Barker of The Dupes” which is probably the bands most junkyard driven track. Scratch that, this is the sound of the junkyard coming to life and attacking the nearest town within the vicinity. Sanko’s lyrics are also fun, especially on the Track “One Way, My Way” where he describes a man with a voice like a sheet of lead and tongue out of which grows a fist.

More standouts include “Kerosene” and “Roost in Peace” as they both demonstrate the bands junk sound to great effect. There is some weakness to the album, though. I would have liked to see more trash percussion here and there, and the tracks “King Know It All” and “That Tongue” could have been skipped all together. Another problem is that there hasn’t been a new Skeleton Key album in roughly six years now. Eric Sanko created something great and could still make something greater. But where is he? Who knows? Maybe King Know It All knows…

Modern Boredom and Pop Tatari

Album: Pop Tatari
Artist: Boredoms
Year: 1992
Genre: Psychedelic Noise Rock.
Label: Warner Music Japan/Reprise/Very Friendly

With the Boredoms, certain questions arise. Are three drummers really necessary? Does Yamataka Eye’s throat ever hurt? Do you really like this band or you just trying to be cool? That last one is probably the most important. Speaking for myself, I like the Boredoms. I think that they are completely fucking mad and would love to see them live. Legends say that their live shows are unlike anything you’ll witness, in this world or the next, and that watching them is similar to an out of body experience. These days the Boredoms are know as V∞redoms and have stripped down their ensemble to a trio of drummers and Eye, who conducts them from a synth or the guitar-neck-wall-thing. But we’re here to discuss the Boredoms of yore and that means noise.

I originally learned of the Boredoms from listening to John Zorn’s Naked City, a Thrash Jazz group that would make even hardened metal heads wet themselves. Yamataka Eye, leader of the Boredoms and all around mad man, provided vocals for the Naked City’s self titled album. Screams, gurgles, yowls, howls and babbles, anything but actual words. Eye’s voice is an alien and frightening thing that, in the hands of evil, could level civilization as we know it.

I was curious to see where this man had come from and ventured out to find an album by the Boredoms. I returned home with their album “Pop Tatari” and have been in love with it ever since. Noisy? Yes. Psychedelic? Very. Avant-Garde? Maddeningly so. This is the sound of the world being sucked into a black hole and then re-emerging as something completely different. It is destruction and creation, Shiva the Destroyer repackaged for the apocalypse fixated generation of the 90’s and it still sounds fresh today. Actually, it sounds like a thousand sheep dying in the heat of a great red sun, but considering that you’ll never hear that anywhere else, I’d say fresh is fair.

Very little music makes me want to dance, and this isn’t dance music, but “Bo Go”, the 4th track on the album, makes me throw myself across the room like an epileptic having a fit. Most people wouldn’t call this dancing, but when I hear that song, I just have to move. Eye is surrounded by an enclave of extremely bizarre and talented musicians, but I couldn’t begin to tell you who played what on this album. If I had to guess, it was a larger ensemble than the current V∞redoms set up, and it sounds more like a rock band then the modern tribal percussion group that they’re now. I’m not saying one is better or worse, I’m just contrasting the difference in sound.

Drums have always been an important part of Boredoms music, it’s just these days that it’s the central focus. Eye once cited Sonic Youth and Funkadelic as primary influences, but I can’t say that just because you like one of those you’ll like this. That would be greatly misleading. This is music for people who are curious about where to start with the Boredoms, or those with a taste for the Avant-Garde. Every Boredoms album is different though, so this listen won’t tell you the whole story, only part of it. Only for the open minded.