Prurient

Arrowhead

BY Eric HillPublished Oct 22, 2008

Fandom for power electronics and noise calls for a difficult aesthetic defence to the outside music world. Some artists create vast slabs of low end that provoke bodily displacement more direct that any punk rock. Others flood the entire spectrum of sound with shifting sheets of noise that obliterate all internal electricity. Prurient (aka Dominic Fernow) lives in the stratosphere of frequencies on Arrowhead, provoking often not much more than provocation itself. Over the three tracks named for the enclosures and contents of the chest Fernow unleashes a hearing test gone wrong. "Sternum” is pitched presumably to approximate the sound of a tool stubbornly piercing bone, complete with little flecks of noise dropping away from time to time. "Ribcage” somehow discovers an even higher tone that’s still sickeningly perceptible (and probably fatal to dogs) and careens on a panning feedback rampage. Finally, the coda "Lungs” presents muted distortion of the same feedback, suggesting damage to the airways and also your hearing from enduring the previous half-hour.
(Editions Mego)

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