2010 • Baked Tapes
It's hard to find good drone these days, it seems. Or ever. Maybe it's just me, but I haven't felt very satisfied with much of it lately (though if you've read my recent drone-related reviews, you already knew that). But I'm persistent, so I'm giving Vales' Fever Monument a shot. Turns out it's not horrible, but it isn't great either, and it could use some beefing up.
Each of its two long sides has its own distinct character that builds up throughout their lengths. Side A is mostly straightforward, "traditional" drone: simple sound waves, short-stacked layers of sound; nothing too imposing. Side B takes on a slightly more aggressive, noisy tone. Both are good in their own ways and the overall sound is pleasant. There isn't much to say about the texture, though.
However I don't think the length of either track is quite justified. Rarely do I hear a drone track that deserves a fifteen-minute runtime, and neither of these are an exception. Side A is the worse offender; being relatively simple, it gets boring after a few minutes and its textural progression is barely noticeable. Side B does much better, having more temporally-local variation in addition to gradual progression, but it still suffers a little from overstaying its welcome. Both of them got a bit tiresome well before they were over.
Despite this (or maybe because of it) Fever Monument does make pretty decent background noise, something I wouldn't mind having on while reading or coding. And side B isn't too bad on its own. But it's still not really for me and probably out of scope for anyone not into the super-underground drone tape scene.
No comments:
Post a Comment