Gridfailure is the brainchild of David Brenner, who provides vocals and plays myriad instruments. Sixth Mass-Extinction Skulduggery III (Nefarious Industries) is the third in a series of five albums that form a dystopian telling of humanity’s downfall in the face of an ever-worsening situation of wars and climate crisis on planet Earth. The album features a host of guest performers providing everything from beat programming to Trumpet to Ukulele.
Sixth Mass-Extinction Skulduggery III is by no means an easy listen. In many ways the tracks here could be categorised more as dark sound collages than songs as such.
Brenner’s vocals provide continuity between the different pieces collected here. His voice is unrelentingly harsh and covered in abrasive distortion. His tortured screams and shouts are strangely entrancing despite their terrifying severity.
The music underneath incorporates a range of influences. Often, the textures most closely resemble noise music. At other times, ambience is employed. Sometimes, Jazzy lines played on trumpets and other instruments cut through.
The album is chock full of talented, and respected collaborators from the underground such as the legend Steve Austin (Today Is The Day) on five of its fifteen songs, as well as performances by Leila Abdul-Rauf (Vastum, Ionophore), Mac Gollehon (live/session for David Bowie, Duran Duran, Onyx, Blondie, Héctor Lavoe), Benjamin Levitt (Megalophobe, Gridfailure-Live), Richard Muller (Giant Spider, Gridfailure-Live), Greg Meisenberg (A Fucking Elephant, Dead Register, Gridfailure-Live), Lane Oliver (Yatsu, Diminishing), Jeff Wilson (Chrome Waves, Deeper Graves), Christopher Henry (Fuck Your Birthday, Humans Etcetera), Graham Scala (US Christmas, Interstitia, Bleach Everything), Dan Emery (Thetan), Bj Allen (Zero Trust), Clayton Bartholomew (Mountaineer), No One (T.O.M.B., Dreadlords), Morgan Y. Evans (Walking Bombs), Hazard (Hasard, Les Chants Du Hasard), Pranjal Tiwari (Cardinal Wyrm, S.C.R.A.M.), Jared Stimpfl (Secret Cutter, Orphan Donor), Natan Vee (Cardinal Wyrm, Fyrhtu), Mike Giuliano (Big Happy), Josh Thorne (Cadaver Industry), Alex Haber, Rosa Henriquez, Pete Tsakiris, Isaac Campbell, and Rob Levitt.
Clean electric guitar lines also float in and out, providing snippets of recognisable musicality.
Found sound also plays an important part throughout Sixth Mass-Extinction Skulduggery III. Field recordings of extreme weather events and even of cooking provide cacophonous atmospherics.
The pieces grind and crash their way through, often in free time. Sometimes live drums permeate through the layers of noise, often playing in spasmic fits and starts. When actual time signatures are used there are occasionally electronic drum beats that owe a debt to trip-hop.
The sound is unquestionably of an avant-garde bent. There is usually little in the way of traditional musical harmony. Instead, a purposefully discordant approach is utilised.
At times, underneath all of the discordance and harshness, genuinely beautiful musical lines can be detected. For example, on “Species Deconstructivist,” mournful and sombre piano lines can be heard amidst the chaos of screams and blast beats.
All of the aforementioned ingredients create a deeply unsettling and disturbing feeling. The record is as cathartic as it is frightening.
Sixth Mass-Extinction Skulduggery III will not be for everyone. Some will simply find the 82 minutes of music too impenetrable or even monotonous. However, those willing to approach the record with an open mind and give it repeat listens will find that beyond the forbidding exterior of this complex work, there is much to appreciate.
Buy the album here:
https://gridfailure.bandcamp.com/album/sixth-mass-extinction-skulduggery-iii
7 / 10
DUNCAN EVANS
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