Hijokaidan: Romance (Alchemy)
Purchased used, probably at Eide's
It's a Monday afternoon, my wife's out of the house. It's not as though I need to fear putting something on down in my studio/man cave (I prefer the former, she calls it the latter) but it's easier sometimes not having to explain it. She walked past recently when I put on a Rusty Warren LP (famous for Knockers Up!). It's pretty tame by more current standards, but she found it strange that I'd put something like that on. It wasn't the content she wondered about so much as the what sounded like a Las Vegas show. Which I guess is partly true.
It's easier not to have to explain this one either, considering it's a full CD length track of blistering, unrelenting noise. There are three people involved: JoJo (Hiroshige) on guitar, Junko (Hiroshige) on voice, and T(oshi) Mikawa on...the Mikawa. Presumably some sort of electronics.
What sounds originate from whom? Sometimes I can tell, but it's such a wall of noise that it's not always possible. And does it matter? Just when I think a high long sound might be the voice, I hear something else that sounds like distorted vocals under it in the mix. I suspect the majority of the sound mass originates from the guitar.
Really, what does it matter? How is possible to judge this? I guess you either accept it or you don't. There's no way to criticize this; what, it's not extreme and offputting enough? A friend once said that it's hard to tell one of these hardcore noise/power electronics groups apart from each other, particularly if there are no vocals. I think there's more to it than that, certain groups do have a particular sound or aesthetic. That said, there's vocals here and I'm still not sure.
I've been looking over the discogs.com page for the label, Alchemy Records. It's a larger catalog than I imagined, with over four hundred releases dating from 1984 to last year. I only really know them from some of their noise releases (Merzbow, Incapacitants, Masonna) but I see the catalog is broader than that. The ones that I have mostly turned up in the used shelves. I mean, who's distributing Alchemy Records releases new in Pittsburgh? I suspect I know who may have bought and later dumped the ones I found, but I'm not naming names. Is it possible I've come across the psychedelic and progressive rock CDs that Alchemy has released and just didn't pay attention to them?
The packaging on some of the Alcheny releases seem almost non-sequitor with respect to the sound. They're not like some industrial/noise artists who make things look dark, or illicit, or hint at fascism. You can see from the image below that the front cover here is a sunset over Greek ruins, with an inside image of what I guess is a desert fox of some sort. I like that intentional disconnection. It's easy to make things seem dark and shocking (a complaint I've always had with Marilyn Manson); it's more interesting to do something actually extreme and present it in a way that makes it look "normal." Maybe that's part of the essence of Surrealism.
The recording fades out just past the hour and seventeen minute mark, pretty much the entire length of a standard CD. They kept going? Cred for energy, and they certain have created a group identity, even if it's applied towards an extended chuck of distortion.
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