If the contents of books are representative of the internal workings of their authors, then if we hold the same to be true for the soundscapes and atmospheres that musician/noisicians create, then I have to confess I am stuck in a sense of morbid curiosity as to what saturnine fantasies are looming around in the heteroclitic minds behind the ACTUARY / Wake the Machines split.
ACTUARY seem more organic than ever before, pouring a delicate concoction of dishevelling noise and mid paced musical crawls for a collective clouded vibrancy, yet one subjected to the shudders of the acute radial blur and edginess born of the coarser moments of contact between the abstract and the systematic, respectively played by noise and rhythmic music. Each track typically has a set pattern of instrumentation, with little if any deviation from its set standard of rhythms, and deceptively serve as the friendly point of entry between listener and record, however this is just the lure to entice the listener into a musical comfort zone, before a creeping fog dawns staining the soundscape in a series of seemingly unconnected yet profound oscillating riddles, industrial hums and voltaic chirps.
They repeat this pattern of trust abuse across all 5 of their bastardised miasmic tracks, each trap and execution differing from the last, yet stained with the same outcome: the listener being caught in a whimsical snare so subtly constructed around you, yet the vividness of detail is there for those who brave to delve deeper down the rabbit hole.
Wake the Machines mechanise for an all guns blazing blitzkrieg approach to sensory punishment, through an unstoppable pincer movement headed on the one flank by a heavy set grindcore colossus and on the other by a slithering and profound constriction of noise. It exhumes this unfastidious brutality that bites deep and hard and refuses to let go, instantly bringing a flight or fight response from the listener, adrenaline pouring in, increased heart rate and muscular tension gripping you throughout their grind schwerpunkt. The reaction from their moments of noise is less antagonising, but by no means less intense bringing this uncomfortable fidgetiness and anticipation for when they will lash out again. Where Actuary used charm and allure, Wake the Machines just endlessly assert audio dominance upon you in the most abrasive of fashions.
The release titled Dehumanization of Species is a very fitting title because instincts kick in listening to this music, it’s a reductionist agenda to remove your understandings of complex and abstract concepts of music and instead to see them fundamentally as a stimuli to certain hard wired evolutionary responses ranging from cautious curiosity, fear, unknowing, panic and exasperation.
As a release not only do I highly commend it as an outstanding piece of work, but given its alloyed expressions of noise and music I feel it is ideal for those as yet unswayed either by the intricacies of noise or the efficacy of grind.
