SUDDEN INFANT “Dark Sperm” (Teenage Whore Tapes)

Having seen the Sudden Infant name pop up on hundreds of harsh noise tours and proceedings amidst presumably like-minded artists with names like Filthy Turd and Bubblegum Shitface, I was fairly apprehensive about a C30 called "Dark Sperm" with a drawing of an ailing fetus on the cover. But hey, books, covers, the judging thereof…I learned that lesson a long time ago. Which is good, cause this tape is a solid spin. The opener, “Eye Box,” is almost like a punk/no-wave song, with really tight riff-blasts of noise punctuated by high pitch shriek-stabs. Totally focused and un-random and more overtly musical than a lot of noise stuff floating around MySpace. The other 2 A-side pieces move into a more trad “sputtering junk/walls of distortion” noise realm, but they still seem controlled and deliberate in a way I can dig. The B kicks off with “Varicose Vienna,” which lurches with Industrial clang and reverb wreckage in a cool Neubauten mode, before morphing into various other savaged landscapes. Despite the darkness of the sperm at hand, there’s a lot of shades and subtleties Sudden Infant’s world. It’s much appreciated.