It’s a cruel irony that, for music which is such a personal and unrestrained expression, so much Noise sounds interchangeable. By forcing the player to respond to orthodox patterns, traditional instruments make it much easier to develop a singular “voice” – by making and manipulating their own sounds out of nothing, Noise artists ironically often end up sounding the same as each other.Continue reading
Given main man Will Lindsay’s pedigree playing in the likes of blackened tree worshippers Wolves in the Throne Room and sadly curtailed doom miscreants Middian, it’s unsurprising that Indian, the Chicago, Illinois quartet he has fronted for the past few years are a devastatingly heavy proposition. Like the bastard child of apocalyptic doom titans Thou and Rwake, but with an added helping of abrasive power electronics to make things just that bit more unpalatable, Indian may be too hard to swallow for many. Their fifth album From All Purity (Relapse Records) is undoubtedly their heaviest and most unpleasant yet, and for those already acquainted with their unique brand of sonic punishment, it can’t come quickly enough.
Over the course of 39 harrowing minutes, Indian attempt to batter the listener into submission with a ceaseless barrage of spiky sludge riffs that aren’t afraid to repeat themselves to make their point well and truly felt, percussion that hits as hard as a drunken preacher taking his belt to a cowering sinner, horrible harsh droning noises that sound like a possessed radio broadcasting live from Chernobyl, and all topped off with Lindsay’s throat-shredding howls and screeches. Tracks like ‘Rape’ are aptly named for that’s precisely what they do to your eardrums while the monolithic crawl of ‘Directional’ is like being dragged to the rack beneath an iron grey sky before all the hope is crushed out of your body.
This gruelling treatment is maintained throughout the entirety of From All Purity with the sadistic riffs of ‘Rhetoric of No’ particularly standing out. However the caustic noise torture of ‘Clarify’ is where things get truly horrific and may have even the hardiest of listeners reaching for the off switch. A triumph in nastiness and one of the most punishing albums you’re likely to endure this year, if at all.
8/10
James Conway