Benjamin van Loon
Indian Handcrafts: Civil Disobedience for Losers (Sargent House, 10/30/12)
“Red Action”
Indian Handcrafts: “Red Action”
If one is company, two is an all-out riot. That’s the reigning message championed by this newest effort from Indian Handcrafts, the Ontario-based duo of Brandyn James Aikins (drums) and Daniel Brandon Allen (guitar).
Pig Destroyer: Book Burner (Relapse, 10/23/12)
“The Diplomat”
After five years of relative inertia, Pig Destroyer — flaring up like an incurable Amazonian virus — is back on the books with Book Burner, a 19-track installation of furious, “misanthropic” grindcore that is as violent as it is relentless. Recorded at guitarist Scott Hull’s Visceral Sound Studios, the album hearkens back to Prowler in the Yard with a raw, live sound that waylays studio artifice for aggression.
Flying Lotus: Until the Quiet Comes (Warp, 10/2/12)
“Putty Boy Strut”
Originally sharpening his teeth with bumper music for Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim, electronic producer Flying Lotus garnered notoriety that bolstered the success of his 2006 debut, 1983. Now with four full-length albums, seven EPs, and countless singles and collaborations, it’s clear that, in retrospect, Steven Ellison has skills that only can be inherited, not taught.
Ephel Duath: On Death and Cosmos EP (Agonia, 8/14/12)
“Black Prism”
Within the tradition of fantasy literature, JRR Tolkein’s Mordor sits somewhere in the borderlands of a dark fantasy world, and just beyond Mordor is what Tolkein’s elves call Ephel Duath — the Mountains of Shadow. Summoning the energy, pathos, and subtle sense of irony culled from these psychic borderlands, Italian progressive-metal veteran Davide Tiso and his Ephel Duath project have conjured yet another potent — if not abbreviated — entry in their increasingly elaborate curriculum mortis.