[reviewed by Iaha Crax]
After 7 years of silence Rage in Eden is releasing a new record from this French project that has already made a name in the industrial underground.
After a noise cut-up introduction, you are captured from the first notes by a professionally made old-school industrial style. When you play the second track, an accurate looping alternation called “Örden”, some of the great pillars of this genre come into mind – Throbbing Gristle or SPK, a sharp sound that cuts directly in your veins.
“The Iron Evangel” pays a tribute to the origins of martial industrial that in its early days was combining austere industrial orchestration with bellicose rhythmic and war-like atmospheres; deprived of any spectacular propagandistic effects. It’s a simple track played only on percussions, with a few but condensed nuances imitating a ceremonial parade. “Hypnotik Spell” is another clinically crafted track, with the power to submerge the listener into a psychedelic trance, progressively receiving more fine electronic nuances. The same percussive apparatus mastered without error envelops the song into an aura of sheer exaltation by means of acidic rhythms.
With “The Death Issue” we are more connected to first endeavors into electroacoustic music made by classic composers such as Pierre Schaeffer or Pierre Henry. A shuffling hiss of scrap metal sheets and irritating sirens remind us both of Turbund Sturmwerk and the historical Pacific 231 from Arthur Honegger that would depict a steam locomotive. It is a superbly organized track bearing an unrelenting force that should be a regal experience for noise enthusiasts.
Further down the road we encounter “Circles Ov Dust”, a chemical Aube- shaped track of the finest electronic improvisation which retains only the skeletal essence from a more percussive Jean-Michel Jarre composition. The recurring sound activates unconscious body movement, and bones seem to vibrate a now virtual flesh. “Higher Law” plays on another great succession of three-dimensional progressive and regressive loops that differ in tonality. A track creating a geometrical architecture that corresponds to archetypal perfection.
The record ends with “O.T. Signal” that mostly resembles a radio transmission from space. Waves of sound strike the shore of perception and then withdraw just to be replaced by what could be their reshaped message into the listener’s brain.
A delightful record of pure industrial sound.
Organisation Toth – The Living Forces Of Evil
Rage in Eden, RAGE 89
CD, Limited, 2012
Santa Sangre 