Noisembryo / Noise Matrix cover

Noisembryo / Noise Matrix

Released

It’s a bit hard to nail down the ‘best’ place to start with Merzbow, partly as he’s released over 400 albums, partly as there are several distinct phases to track through his forty-plus years of dedication to noise. But Noisembryo is as good a Merzbow album as any, indeed better than most; unrelenting and yet hypnotic, somehow flickering with surprising detail, its evocations of crushing steelworks, chemical flammables and drag racing burnouts match velocity with volume. Its textural richness rewards repeated listening, even as its decisive cut-offs and disorienting channel-switching repeatedly jolt your body into unholy contortions. An incredible rush.

Jon Dale

Suggestions
Cake cover

Cake

Jonathan Coleclough
Gottfried Michael Koenig cover

Gottfried Michael Koenig

Gottfried Michael Koenig
August 1974 cover

August 1974

Taj Mahal Travellers
Tusk cover

Tusk

The Dead C
Another Evening At Logos 1974 79 81 cover

Another Evening At Logos 1974 79 81

Max Eastley, Derek Bailey, COUM Transmissions, Logos Ensemble, Feminist Improvising Group