TARPIT “Walls and Windows” (All Gone)

Like the bathroom stalls beneath old Veterans Stadium before they blew that abomination right up, Tarpit’s “music” is coated in grime and other unmentionable substances. It is likely that this artist/group is from Philly as well, at least according to the scant pieces of information that the internet turns up. But since I’m not about to poke around the old dark web for any further bits and pieces, you get what you get from me, an honest opinion on a barely coherent industrial/noise album. That sounds like damning commentary, but I assure you, if you’re the type of person who can stomach whatever still crawls in the dark corners of abandoned SEPTA subway stations, you’re probably in for a treat with Tarpit. The clangs, the squirms, the grotesqueries, all serve the greater whole of displacement and disillusionment. Coherence? Who needs it! Get lost in the muck – like, literally get lost until you’re truly unable to find your way home. Become one of the sewer people who are almost certainly living under every major metropolitan area. Especially Philly! One day they will all rise up and reclaim the surface.

All Gone

--Ryan Masteller

CRUDE REZNOR “Vernon#30 (All Gone)

Two things are hard to escape when listening to the garbled nether-vibes of Crude Reznor: (1) the inescapable presence of everybody’s favorite Reznor, Trent, and (2) the palpable degradation of composition to its “hoagie sleaze” state. Make that “moistening” instead of “degradation.” Well, not really “moistening.” It’s more of a smeary concoctability than anything, a devil-may-care attitude to the whole idea of consumption. But you’re distracting me; it’s hard to concentrate on anything when you’re questioning all my “hoagie sleezes.”

Crude Reznor’s compositions don’t remotely not draw comparisons to early industrial music – they surely recall the experimental cacophony of early purveyors of the genre, replete with the requisite bizarro samples and wacko electronic touches. But if you were going to pit Trent Reznor against Crude Reznor in a winner-take-all freakout competition, I’m not sure the Crude wouldn’t outweird the Trent. The plunderphonic craziness, especially as the tape progresses, might just make Trent nuts enough to toss in that towel fairly early in the match.

And you know what hoagie sleeze is, right? It’s when you get a hoagie from a supermarket or something, and it’s gotten extra moist because it’s been in the wrapping, so the bun starts to disintegrate from the wetness when you try to eat it. It’s icky and sloppy, and it begins the inevitable decay of the sandwich at perhaps too early a point in its existence. Sometimes Vernon#30 seems moist and disintegrative, like the tape’s been stuck in a fridge and saran wrapped in with some leftover watermelon slices or something. It’s exactly the kind of post-post-production the tracks needed – they’re gross, they’re humid, they’re wonderful.

This all to say – I’ll provide some thumbs in the general up direction for Vernon#30, as it’s a weird-ass, perfectly relistenable smattering of wackjob composition. If I may give you some advice, all of you one-on-one Thunderdome-esque gladiatorial aficionados: never bet against the weirdest dude in the room. That’s the guy that’s gonna walk away with the trophy.

All Gone

-- Ryan Masteller

BLUE SUEDE PLATFORMS “Wood Hat” (All Gone)

The British just keep on invading, don’t they? Blue Suede Platforms run their jangle-heavy garage recordings through the Beat Happening school of enthusiasm for recording, coming off like the Kinks or the Creation exploded in the microwave if either of those bands were a burrito that was left in on high for too long. The Liverpudlians – mainly, it seems, a guy and a girl – like making songs, recording them to four-track or a lone tape player, and damned if the results are weird when the guy sings in a falsetto. That’s OK, though, it’s probably a fun conceit live. And remember, enthusiasm! How can you knock anyone for enthusiasm? At least it’s not all Jimmy Buffett paraphrases.

Blue Suede Platforms
All Gone

--Ryan Masteller