Graveyards - Screwed & Chopped (Brokenresearch, 2009) ****

Of all the upcoming releases on Brokenresearch, this one of Graveyards is without a doubt one of the most powerful ones. The band consists of John Olson on reeds with Ben Hall on percussion and noise, Hans Buetow on cello and Chris Riggs on electric guitar. The music is close to impossible to describe : it sounds like the soundtrack for a horror movie, all doom and gloom, with slow, very slow sound explorations, full of reverb and cathedral-like echoes. Don't even think about melody, rhythm or anything close to jazz, because all you get is endless scraping sounds and odd percussion, like screeching doors, cracking wood, short drones, repetitive industrial beats, alternated with what comes close to animal-like roars, wails, but then just that notch too unfamiliar to classify them, to define their origin, taking away all footholds and even the possibility of getting to know what is going on. It sounds creepy and scary. It does. The listening experience comes close to the reading experience of Mark Z. Danielewski's "House Of Leaves". For those who have read the book : to me this is what you hear in the endless labyrinth below the house. Really strong stuff.

(sorry for the artwork above : because this is an LP, I had to scan it in two parts on my scanner and then re-assemble).

© stef