Lately, I’ve been really fascinated by the world of Harsh Noise Wall music. This is some of the most nihilistic uncompromising sound ever recorded and in many ways it seems like the natural evolution of noise and drone music. At some point both of these genres needed to move away from the gestural and into the realm of the truly static and the work of Vomir (a.k.a. Roro Perrot) is a particularly great example of these genres’ evolution/synthesis into the unrelenting juggernaut that is HNW.
Perrot’s work is driven by the mantra “NO CHANGE, NO COMPROMISE, NO REMORSE,” and as a result, it might be tempting for many casual listeners to write off his work as sounding too similar. However, listen closely to enough of the man’s compositions and it becomes clear that Perrot’s monolithic walls of static contain multitudes in a manner similar to the seemingly austere drones of Eliane Radigue or Phil Niblock.
Perrot’s most recent album pour Monsieur Jean ou l’amour absolu is an excellent introduction to the world of HNW that finds the artist working with a slightly more high register wall of noise than usual. Perhaps, this slight change in register is related to the surprising tenderness of the album’s title, which translates to “for Jean or absolute love” and indeed, there is something almost euphoric in the crushing mountain of sound presented here. Like all of Vomir’s records, its possible to listen to pour Monsieur Jean ou l’amour absolu passively and revel in its stasis, but intensely focusing on the work reveals continuously changing textures and rhythms that are hidden in the constant onslaught of distortion. In many ways, it almost seems like Perrot’s work as Vomir is an implicit conceptual exploration of the chaotic properties of white noise. Vomir’s releases illustrate that there’s already so much going on in a white noise signal that there’s not necessarily a reason to listen to anything else. For some, this may seem like a bleak sentiment but I personally can’t wait to see the micro cosmos that Perrot and his like-minded peers discover in these static clouds next.
pour Monsieur Jean ou l’amour absolu is out now via Crisis. You can stream the record in its entirety below:
• Vomir http://www.decimationsociale.com
• Crisis http://www.crisisrecords.blogspot.fr
More about: Vomir
