Classic ultra-fucked electrified noise barrage that seems to reflect more on the early-90s pornographic Merzbow sound et al than anything currently beating its head against a rock. Just chaos blurts of white noise catharsis cut up with quizzical gloops down the plughole where you feel like a cartoon roadrunner, still peddling in mid-air while rainbows explode into shards of glass and crystal. A fantastic blast of old school noise from these old school boize: John Wiese and Kohei Gomi aka Pain Jerk. Recorded by mail October 2005.

New limited 7 inch from this powerhouse psychedelic Japanese/Australian noise trio featuring Ayako Honda, Hirofumi Uchino and Laura Oyaizu who use gadgets, junk and fuzz to generate tempestuous post-Industrial metal machine music.

Limited edition of 100 copies split LP only ‘officially’ available direct from the label and the artists themselves. This one presents some earlier material from both groups, recorded live at the 13th Note in Glasgow in November 2006 and features Minoise in classic actionist-assault mode and Insecten in his early punk-primitive one cymbal, one microphone and a ticket to oblivion phase.

Edition of 250 collaboration LP between Mark Durgan’s Putrefier (whose history goes right back to the Broken Flag label) and Dean Glaister’s Romance. This set has much more in common with European electronic improvisers like Voice Crack, Hugh Davies and Michel Waisvisz than any contemporary UK ‘noise’, with minimal, low-level circuitry making allusive crackling connections between sudden pin-points of fuzz and architectures of pure current. Recorded live in Newcastle in 2007, all different paste-on sleeves.

Edition of 200 copies with ink-stamped sleeves that reissues the rarest release on the Broken Flag label. Violence was released as a cassette in 1982. It’s a solo recording by Gary Mundy that predates the beginnings of Ramleh, Mundy’s solo Kleistwahr recordings etc. Using the same equipment as on the early Ramleh recordings, Violence is a claustrophobic slice of grainy electronic excess with a murk of psychedelic electronics and tortured vocals in the style of the early BR power electronics sides. Mastered direct from cassette for maximum skin burn.

Major limited edition split LP, released to coincide with the LAFMS retrospective in London. One live side from each, with a thunderous performance from Japanese noise gods Hijokaidan featuring legendary free jazz percussionist Sabu Toyozumi (Kaoru Abe/Masayuki Takayanagi et al) on drums, Jojo Hiroshige on guitar, Junko on vocals and Toshiji Mikawa and Fumio Kosakai on electronics. Recorded live at Earthdom 27^th December 2009. Over on the flip we get an expanded Airway line-up – still the most obliterating of the LAFMS projects – featuring Joe Potts, Rick Potts, Tom Recchion, Dennis Duck, John Duncan, Fredrik Nilsen, Vetza, Linda Pitmon and Aaron Moore. Recorded live at Gramercy Theatre New York 22^nd October 2009. Very limited supply. 

Edition of only 250 copies reissue of what was originally a limited cassette release (BF3) on the legendary Broken Flag label. Kleistwahr is the solo project of BF head Gary Mundy (Ramleh/S.P.I.T.E./Skullflower/Consumer Electronics et al). One of the earliest releases on the label, Myth more than fulfils the promise of the UK’s power electronics scene to fully deliver on punk’s failure to fully liberate rock/roll from the service of generic form. The first track is massively psychedelic – Ramleh always were the most ‘psych’ focussed of the BF groups, as their later ‘rock’ albums underline – with a churning miasmic appeal that sounds like it’s devouring several decades of outlaw sound with alla the triumphal Non of the first Faust album. Later tracks are a little more pugilistic, with electronics that double all over themselves again and again, generating hypnotic matrices of pulse-based melodies and whooshing outer space F/X. Indeed, the degree of obsessive repeat here makes this a minimalist Industrial classic, doing more with a simple set up of electronics and vocals than your favourite goddamn avant orchestra. Parts of this inexplicably remind me of Alan Silva’s electronics on the Celestrial Communication Orchestra’s classic The Seasons triple LP – go figure! Either way this is another major BF unearthing and highly recommended. 

Edition of only 250 copies reissue of what was originally a limited 1983 cassette release (BF15) on the legendary Broken Flag label. Kleistwahr is the solo project of BF head Gary Mundy (Ramleh/S.P.I.T.E./Skullflower/Consumer Electronics et al) and Arsonicide matches the early hysterical Whitehouse sound with harsh oscillating feedback, electronics and wild vocal assaults. Some amazing bloody-minded noise on this, with the epic second track that combines arcing cracked synth tones and sudden explosions of voice matching the best of Maurizio Bianchi’s ‘symphonic’ work but with a supremely crude UK DIY edge that is particularly satisfying. On the flip the electronics get even more alienated and extreme, with minimal morse code patterns dancing beneath flat-line feedback drones and waves of minimal tone threat. Spectacularly great and highly recommended!

Massively unlikely documentation of one of the key ‘missing’ UK underground/noise/Industrial groups, the short-lived Black Country based Death Magazine 52 aka Spontaneous Human Combustion: Death Magazine 52 were the final group to headline the legendary Equinox Event that took place in London in June of 1983 but actual documentation of their sound has been thin on the ground. This revelatory 2xLP set bundles all extant recordings, two sides of studio recordings as well as some insane live shows, including an afternoon gig in front of a school hall full of teenage girls at Queen Marys Girlschool in Walsall as well as their closing Equinox performance. The studio recordings are massively crude bass and percussion heavy Industrial jams with an urgent ‘new wave’ edge, w/wobbly brass and electro stylings that come out of the Heathen Earth songbook alongside some classic entropic junk ritual and fucked up tape work. The live recordings have a wilder, ritualistic appeal, with a Wolverhampton show that crosses punk-primitive brass and headhunter horns with free percussion rallies in a way that makes you think of Tori Kudo’s industrial orchestra plays New York Eye And Ear Control. But it’s the girlschool show and the Equinox event recording that are the real gravy, their Oundle School moment followed by the break-up of the Equinox show by the police. A few brief minutes of absolute refusenik out-of-time percussion and slowly expiring brass runs, complete with guest vocalist Philip Best from Whitehouse/Consumer Electronics, leads into a police bust that comes over as some of the most hilarious Industrial theatre ever put to wax. As close as you will ever come to being there. A major unearthing and another fascinating episode in England’s Hidden reverse. Highly recommended!

Timely reissue of this insanely enjoyable 1995 collaboration between Mark Durgan aka UK noise/avant gardist Putrefier and Andy Bolus aka Evil Moisture: originally released on Mother Savage Noise Productions, this is headier, heavier and more rock/rhythm-damaged than the bulk of either player’s catalogue. It has all of the churning, squeamishness of Merzbow, the cut ‘n’ splat of Violent Onsen Geisha, even the monolithic electro assault of primo Smegma but somehow it all coheres into something that is uniquely bulldozing, staggering dazed into junk yards of ritualistic percussion while the bottom end crawls like a slug and the sound of microphones entering orifices pass for ‘lead vocals’. The combo of ludicrously heavy EMS synth and scrappy percussive violence surpasses even Conrad Schnitzler’s early work in terms of total musical refusal. This upgraded edition cuts the cassette release into three sides of insanely pulverising vinyl while adding a forth of live tracks from 1994 and 2006 as well as including a bonus 24 page Bolus comic book. “Supercharge accomplishes what all reissues should: it doesn't just narrate epic battles of the past, it reintroduces all-but-forgotten combat tactics to a new generation of aural guerillas.” Amen to that, a fantastic OTT noise side – these guys truly deserve a medal. 

Very limited reissue of this legendary Broken Flag compilation originally released on cassette in 1983: this reissue was originally intended to coincide with the Never Say When Broken Flag event that took place in London in May of 2012 but it’s only now seeing the light of day. This is one of the most radical and profoundly a-musical documents of Broken Flag’s uniquely primitive and ferociously raw DIY aesthetic. It features exclusive tracks from Ramleh, The New Blockaders, Sir Ashleigh Grove, Vortex Campaign, Citipati and Depilate Corps. The Sir Ashleigh Grove track (a New Blockaders ‘satellite’) is particularly astounding, a long two/three note track of scouring minimalist debris and fucked-up martial beatbox that sounds like buckled metal played by Sun Ra. The New Blockaders track is a beautiful example of their ferocious early DIY electro-acoustic style with that shed at the bottom of the garden appeal that makes the early recordings so unique while working in the same area as Ferial Confine. The Ramleh track is a totally hysterical and barely comprehensible live ‘power electronics’ assault while Depilate Corps turn in an eerie feedback choral that’s heady with implied threat. A phenomenal set, one of the best early Industrial/noise compilations and a solid spin from start to finish, highly recommended!