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Blue Sabbath Black Cheer



Last Updated: 12/7/2009

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Status: Single
City: SEATTLE
State: Washington
Country: US
Signup Date: 12/13/2005

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Tuesday, February 23, 2010 

Current mood:Stoned
Category: Music
Gnarled Forest releases can be ordered directly by contacting gnarledforest [at] hotmail [dot] com. Paypal accepted using gnarledforest [at] hotmail [dot] com. Reservations accepted, but not held past 1 week of release date. Gnarled Forest vinyl & cassette selections are available thru several record shops around the world. If a release says ~Deleted, then please check with the shops listed below for availability.


(GF35) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer & Rubber (O) Cement split c20, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF34) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer & Sixes split c20, edition of 100 ~Available Now

(GF33) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer & irr.app.(ext.) ’Skeletal Imposition’ c20, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF32) Nihilist Assault Group & Blue Sabbath Black Cheer - Planned Obsolesence collab LP, edition of 500 ~Available Now

(GF31) Dried Up Corpse & Numb Erone split c30, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF30) Drowner c30, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF29) Nihilist Assault Group c20, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF28, TMU208) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer - Dead Death, Death Dead LP, edition of 500 ~Available, split label release with Troubleman Unlimited ~Deleted

(GF27) Dried Up Corpse & The Cherry Point split c26, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF26) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer & Dead Machines split c24, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF25) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer & Dried Up Corpse split 10'', edition of 300 ~Available

(GF24) Dried Up Corpse & Slates split c15, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF23) Dried Up Corpse c15, edition of 100 ~Available

(GF22) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer & Slates split c20, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF21) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer & Terrortank split c20, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF20) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer & Demonologist split c15, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF19, WWDIS006) BSBC - The Endless Blockade LP, edition of 525 (420 on Black Wax, 105 on Red for GF Mailing List Subscribers) (split label release with What We Do Is Secret) ~Deleted

(GF18) BSBC & Drowner split c30, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF17) BSBC "Prossneck, Germany 1629" c15, edition of 100 ~Deleted

(GF16) BSBC untitled LP, GF mailing list test edition of 62 on black vinyl ~Deleted, Reg edition of 300 on white vinyl ~Deleted

(GF15) Bleak Village Vol. 1 v/a c84, edition of 100 ~Available

(GF14) BSBC "For The Sickly Weaklings" LP, GF mailing list test edition of 27 ~Deleted, Reg edition of 300 ~ Deleted

(GF13) BSBC & Penetration Camp split c40, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF12) BSBC & Hymns of Despondent Solitude split c40, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF11) BSBC "For The Sickly Weaklings" c30, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF10) BSBC "Catacombs" c29, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF09) BSBC "Blue Sabbath Black Cheer" c20, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF08) BSBC "The Sense of Violence/ Supremacy of Decay" c15, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF07) BSBC "Funeral Rehearsal" c20, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF06) BSBC & Behalf split c15, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF05) BSBC untitled c20, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF04) BSBC "Scum Tapes" 2 x c19 set, edition of 25 ~Deleted

(GF03) BSBC "Death Crawl" c11, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF02) "Pink Floyd" live collab with Du Hexen Hase c77, edition of 50 ~Deleted

(GF01) BSBC "Drowning In Hate" CDr,  edition 33 ~Deleted 
 


Gnarled Forest selections are available from the following distributors around the world:

Armageddon http://www.armageddonshop.com USA

Aquarius http://www.aquariusrecords.org USA

Troubleman Unlimited http://www.troublemanunlimited.com USA

RRR http://www.rrrecords.com USA

Fusetron http://www.fusetronsound.com USA

Eclipse http://www.eclipse-records.com USA

Zions Gate http://www.kreationrecords.net USA

Revolver http://www.midheaven.com USA

Tomentosa http://www.tomentosarecords.com USA

Cheap Thrills http://www.cheapthrills.ca Canada

Cargo http://www.cargorecords.co.uk UK


Second Layer http://www.secondlayer.co.uk UK

Aurora Borealis http://www.aurora-b.com UK

Volcanic Tongue http://www.volcanictongue.com Scottland

Release The Bats http://www.releasethebats.com/rtb.html Sweden
Monday, February 22, 2010 

Current mood:Stoned
Category: Music
New Reviews

From Aquarius Records: NIHILIST ASSAULT GROUP & BLUE SABBATH BLACK CHEER Planned Obsolescence LP
This one is definitely for the noise crowd. Doomlords might find this latest joint from Northwester dronedoomdirge duo (now trio apparently) Blue Sabbath Black Cheer a little too punishing. We can only assume it's the influence of Nihilist Assault Group, not that BSBC didn't have noisy tendencies before, but here, the two combine forces to unleash a blackened Merzbowian beast, two side long blowouts of grinding white noise drenched hiss and glitch and howl and buzz. At low volume, like much of this ilk, one might mistake this for TV static, or a vacuum cleaner, or the needle slipping off the record and scraping over the label, a cacophony of crunch and scrape and gristly fuzz, blurred into heaving clouds of NOISE.
Strap some headphones on though if you dare, and there's definitely more going on than meets the ear, some churning almost rhythms, cool textures, tangled strands of drone and rumble and whir, but that's all buried underneath an avalanche of satanic hiss and skull caving, amp destroying white noise brutality.
Awesome stuff, if your ears can handle it. Again, very little in the way of doom, or even low end to be found here, but if you like to sit back, and relax to some Incapacitants, dine to a little Merzbow, or entertain to the strains of Hijokaidan, then heck, this might be the perfect soundtrack for your next nihilistic dinner party.

From Crucial Blast: BLUE SABBATH BLACK CHEER + NIHILIST ASSAULT GROUP Planned Obsolescence
Whoa...it's not as if I was expecting the latest LP from the Seattle industrial/doom/noise heathens Blue Sabbath to be easy listening, their sound has always been noisy and grim and caustic, equal parts industrial creep and blackened doom abstraction, but this is noisy on a whole new scale. Definitely the noisiest fucking platter that we've ever gotten from the band, and it appears that you can blame it all on the presence of old school noisemakers Nihilist Assault Group, who have teamed up with Blue Sabbath Black Cheer for this ear-rattling collaboration. Nihilist Assault Group has members of industrial legends The New Blockaders, but their sound is way more extreme, and together with BSBC have crafted two sidelong pieces of molten nuclear noise, each side a swirling, raging malestrom of blackened distortion, waves of screaming static and oscillating test-tone frequencies, roaring low-end heaviness and corrosive electronic glitchery. We're talking about a sheer wall of textural crunch and throbbing, swirling, all-devouring black noise, more like The Rita or Vomir than the nightmarish creeping industrial sludge that I'd normally expect to hear from the Blue Sab camp. It really is that deep into HNW territory, and extreme harsh noise fans will LOVE this record. But at the same time, there's some serious layering to this sound, too, with soaring subterranean drones, crushing mangled rhythmic grind, near blacknoise-levels of aggression all swimming deep beneath these raging oceanic waves of hellish low-end drone-noise. An absolutely brutal noise album.
Limited to five hundred copies, and packaged in a fantastic looking black and white jacket with creepy artwork from Dominic Black, and includes a heavy printed insert.

From Aquarius : Dead Death Death Dead LP
We're running out of ways to describe these guys. Our thesaurus has been bled dry. Bleak, hateful, grim, blackened, harsh, hellish... By now you should have at least an idea of where this diabolical duo are coming from. Epic slow motion expanses of blacknoize, and rumbling blown out low end, howled blackened dronemusic, ritualistic abstract guitar torture, these four tracks here, three are live, and previously released (but on tapes and cd-r's so limited, that unless you were THERE, you probably never saw one), one is previously UNreleased, well worth it for the black hearted and evil ear-ed.
The live tracks are brutal, might be the heaviest we've heard these guys, processed black soundscapes woven from grinding industrial crunch and howled hellish vox, heaving slabs of caustic low end dissipate in clouds of whirring downtuned thrum, way more effects than usual, tripped out and almost psychedelic sounding, streaked with super distorted white noise hiss. The B side begins with some gurgling black ambience, all rumble and creep, peppered with corrosive shards of amp buzz, eventually growing more and more heavy culminating in a strange assemblage of cool moaning melting riffage. That riffage then gets locked into a strangely hypnotic loop before devolving into yet more freaked out abstract heaviness.
Intense, punishing, pummeling, black as fuck and heavy as all get out, which to those of you into that sort of thing, means this is definitely recommended.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES! Comes in an incredible sleeve, spot varnished animal head on a rich black background, with an 11" x 11" printed insert.

From Crucial Blast: Dead Death, Death Dead LP.
This latest vinyl-only release from the blackdoom industrial noise behemoth Blue Sabbath Black Cheer is actually a collection of rare out-of-print live material taken from one of the band's early tape releases and an obscure compilation, with one new previously unreleased track included for good measure. As per the usual with these guys, it's a limited edition release, but the packaging is one of the best that they've come up with, with some really strange imagery and a cool print job that makes this one of their coolest looking records.
The two a-side tracks are both from the Dead cassette that came out on Scumbag Tapes, and it's Blue Sabbath Black Cheer at their heaviest. The first one, "Borre Fen", sounds like a more spacious Gnaw Their Tongues piece; it starts off with huge waves of deep black ambience washing up over piles of industrial clang and stabs of symphonic strings, and then pull back to reveal monstrous growling vocals and harsh grating metal sounds creeping out of the abyss. As the track continues, murky machine noises and dense whirring ribbons of dubbed-out bass and scraping scrapmetal swirl together into a nightmare soundscape of crushing black industrial ambience with howling anguished vocals and bestial pitch-shifted death metal roars that sound like they are wafting up from hell itself, and eventually the band lurches into a crescendo of crumbling blacknoise and pounding oildrum percussion. It's one of the most horrific things I've ever heard from these guys. The next track "Black Acid" is equally heavy, beginning with a guitar grinding out thick buzzing powerchords against a churning backdrop of static air-raid sirens and crackling black electricity. Within moments, the droning sludgeguitar and harsh noise are whipped into a frenzy, turning into a cacophonous mass of super-heavy distorted chaos, almost bordering on power electronics. Howling feedback drones pierce the filth, and slurred, inhuman vocals roar furiously through the torrent of noise, almost drowning out the screams of total abject suffering that echo in the background. Imagine a more droning, ambient Stalaggh with huge black pustules of mega-distorted Total-like guitar skree and drone erupting everywhere, while damned souls are stripped of their flesh somewhere out of sight.
The first of the tracks on the flipside comes from the Feral Debris Vol II compilation from 2007, and is more along the lines of the more recent Blue Sabbath stuff - a thick, murky slab of inpenetrable black drone infested with malfunctioning tape noises, gurgling gutteral vocals, writhing clusters of electrical buzz, the sound spread out and omninous, not so much crushing but still immensely heavy and threatening, especially when terrified screams and gasping agonized howls start to appear alongside those hideously distorted demon-roars, which become so massive and engulfing that it feels like the earth itself is tearing apart and turning into a great black all-devouring chasm. The untitled track that follows is a previously unreleased piece, droning feedback hum and crumbling distorted loops and shafts of squealing high-end skree, blackened dronenoise roar slithering out of the pit, drowning in piles of industrial clang and stinking once-human offal and crushing distorted sludge...and then this roar of sound drops out for a couple of minutes, leaving behind smears of bassy amp hum and hellish puking snarls and delicate feedback filigree that hover in the air, slowly building in intensity back into a wall of blazing hellish noizeblast, equal parts Abruptum and The Rita, the screams of the torn-apart swimming in an ocean of caustic sound, finally turning into a powerful roaring distorto-drone at the end, before fading into the blackness.
Yeah, this is definitely one of the heaviest Blue Sabbath releases. Even though the material comes from a couple of different sources, it comes together perfectly as a single nightmare vision on the record, and since most of us never had a chance of grabbing the original tapes/cdrs when they came out, this is pretty much new music. The record is gorgeously packaged in a black jacket with spot varnish printing and creepy cover artwork of a decaying elk head wrapped in twine and hanging in midair, and it includes an 11" by 11" cardstock insert. Limited edition of five hundred.

From Rock-A-Rolla: Crows Eat The Eyes From The Leviathans Carcass CD

In the 1980s, it was claimed that Siberian geologists had accidentally found the entrance to Hell – no, really, actual Hell – and recorded the awful sounds emanating from the underworld. This tape is now easy to find on the web. However, it’s hugely disappointing and about as harrowing as a cottage-cheese Ryvita. Blue Sabbath Black Cheer claim no purgatorial pedegree, but seem much more likely to be the real thing. This collection of lost archive material and unreleased work showcases the duo’s attempts to make the most disturbing nightmarish music on this world or the next. Viscous bass degradation, shrieking electronic frequencies that can slice titanium, the death-rattles of carnosaurs… this is scorchingly nasty stuff, and should be avoided by the fecund, the alive and anyone who wants to sleep ever again. All these authentic churning hellscapes will do is claw at your medulla oblongata and curdle the livestock.

From Aquarius: BSBC/Penetration Camp - Bleak Village : Mob Rules split LP.  We'll keep this short, since we wanted to get 20 or 30 of these, ended up getting 10, and by the time this hits the list, we'll probably have less than that. We have way more copies of the forthcoming BSBC already reserved, but for this one, only the first lucky handful of you will likely score one of these.
Blue Sabbath Black Cheer teams up with a band called Penetration Camp for two sides of crushing abstract low end heaviness (as if you were expecting something else?). The BSBC side is 33rpm, for maximum sloooooooowness, a whirring crackling hissing rumbling drift, like the wash of helicopter rotors, the crackle of burning torches, this almost sounds like some strange field recording, and is definitely the prettiest thing we've heard from these guys. At least at first. Deep swells, warm and weirdly melodic, building to a coda of abrasive crashing chaos, thick and prickly and crunchy, before settling back down into a second movement, which sounds like the first, only the sounds have been doused in extra treble and skree, everything sharper and more jagged, laced with inhuman screams and the hellish sounds of dying electronics.
The flipside is at 45, and no matter what the title or the bastardized insert artwork might lead you to believe, sadly this is NOT a cover of Black Sabbath's "Mob Rules", or if it is, kudos to Penetration Camp for rendering it 100 percent unrecognizable. The perfect match for BSBC, a bleak bit of creeped out black ambient crawl, fucked up stretched out heavily effected vocals wrapped around bit bursts of industrial crunch, thick swaths of sinister buzz, the grinding scrape and crumbling crunch eventually overtaking the deep rumbling drones.


From Plague Haus: Blue Sabbath Black Cheer / Dried Up Corpse split 10".
It’s been awhile since I’ve dropped written anything about my favorite Seattle noise-mongers. I raved so much so frequently I was afraid people my think I was on the payroll. This bit of nastiness was originally released as an extremely limited (50) cassette earlier this year on the What We Do Is Secret label, but like most of BSBC’s catalog, it just fits perfect on vinyl. And for those that may not know, Dried Up Corpse is a side project of Stan Reed’s, he’s one half of BSBC.
BSBC kick off Side A with an untitled track. The thing yawns open like the gates of hell as distant thuds sound reminding me of camping with the Blair Witch. A sample (?) of someone chanting, or moaning, begins a long note like a strained cello. Insects chew and someone unseen old god growls in hunger. Seriously, if I had the money to do a series of Lovecraft audio books, these guys would do the background music for everyone. That’s why I’ve always hesitated to throw that “Noise” label on them. There’s no twiddling of distortion peddle knobs. It’s pure Aural Horror. Small explosive burst, a long blast like the horn of some ship lost in the fog and it’s over, just a bit over 8 minutes long.
DUC takes a turn on Side B. It’s half as long as the previous and is not unlike the sound of the wind through the rain forest. There’s a slight electronic undertone, but the majority of the track does feel very organic. It’s droning, light and minimal compared to the oppressiveness of the former side, but not in a bad way. It’s the come down.

From Foxy Digitalis: Crows Eat The Eyes From The Leviathans Carcass CD 
The latest from the uneasy duo is a collection of sorts, being selections from some early out of print releases with a couple unreleased tunes for leaven. Still, you what is coming from Wm.Rage and Stan Reed: brutal, noisy, cathartic screams from the depths of nightmares you are glad you don’t have. The title itself, “Crows Eat The Eyes From The Leviathans Carcass,” suggests illness on a grand scale, and that proves to be true.
Of the seven tracks, the untitled second and fifth are the previously unreleased. Still, as you might expect, they are relentless in their grim, howling rage. Likewise, “Maqggot” and the traumatizing 17 minute “Borre Fen/Untitled” blend formless, ambient darkness with howling screaming fury. These would be great soundtracks to any film made by ToeTag Pictures, or by underground horror director Jim Van Bebber. There is no hope offered, just a raw look at a soul disintegrating in its own torment.
Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, like their Seattle home, is mostly dark and unsettled weather, but oddly beautiful in its extremes. As dense and bleak as it is, “Crows Eat The Eyes From The Leviathans Carcass” retains a power and such a sense of total overload that it is impossible to look away. “Awe” is a word not out of place here, though “sickening” isn’t either. 8/10

From Tiny Mixed Tapes: Crows Eat The Eyes From The Leviathans Carcass CD
Seattle’s incredibly prolific doom metal outfit Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, consisting primarily of members Stan Reed and wm.Rage, have released a slew of 7-inches, splits, CD-Rs, and cassettes, collaborating and conspiring with peers in their community to generate one of the more viciously enviable catalogues of sound-vomit, death, and hatred to ever be thrown against the monolithic brick wall of noise. Their sound is metal inverted. Like other bands within the doom milieu, BSBC do not make songs, but rather create soundscapes, borderline narrative-based explosions and showcases in control and sound and moment. They are a commentary on what it means to be metal, on that kid with the pet scorpion who had “Led Zepplin” [sic] smacked across his English 2 binder, on John Wayne Gacy, on Yngwie Malmsteen, on shitty horror movies and exploitation films, and on the overly pompous yet glorious and wonderful absurdity of it all.
Crows Eat The Eyes From The Leviathan’s Carcass consists of a live performance, a collaboration with Anakrid, a few songs released previously on cassettes, compilations, and 7-inches, and two previously unreleased tracks. Yet in spite of this fact, the record has an uncanny cohesion, a pummeling template of unmatched horror. Their songs are atonal, without melody or song structure, and completely devoid of anything aurally attractive in the conventional sense. BSBC, like so many before them, are creating environments — absolute grave and punishing, disgusting environments — with their collages. The untitled second portion of the sixth track is a tundra, patchy and cold, lifeless, with a distanced clamoring and clanging of sadness, and an anger of the growls, something sexless and furious, confusedly looking for nourishment upon the cold and open plain. “Genocide” is a black box recording, a wordless glimpse at the fear within a man’s bloody pupils. The shrieks are inhuman, the actions taking place within a hollow warehouse.
Jesus, those screams, yelps, growls — tortured and pained hisses. You can practically hear the hair on the chest. Throughout the album, the vocals range from squeals and cackles to roaring and bloody belches. “Maggot” contains vocals menacing and hungry, Beelzebub’s anus teething on entrails in a pool of fuzz. The squeals of a warthog, of a 10-foot high warthog, cavorting in the foreground of consciousness. Likewise, in the opening track, the searing jet-engine howls and plodding death march is torn in half by a tape-hissed, bowel-loosening slurred roar of hate and chaos. The genuine feeling and thought and emotions put into the hateful bellows of this album are stunning, and this limb, the vocals, will particularly stand out within the first listen.
Aside from the voices, though, you can’t place the origin of a single goddamn sound on this record, even things you know have to be guitars. This is a very refreshing feeling, allowing one to fully understand individual perception of sound— something that one could only hope to be expected of all music. “Borre Fen,” the lone collaboration, is pure expanse, just open sound and controlled blasts. Everything begins at a distance, everything seems important, with the atonal mammoth shift of one piece of matter against another, as shitting and fucking yelps and gasps are just barely heard in the background. Bows rub against steel, children cry and scream in fear, and one wonders what this is building up to. But chances are it isn’t building up to something, but that it simply is something. "It" is what it is building up to. It is. The entire album is, and anyone’s hard-on for peaks and valleys will be stoically flaccid and tucked in between their legs upon hearing the horrid monolith that is Blue Sabbath Black Cheer.

From Norman Records: Blue Sabbath Black Cheer / Dried Up Corpse split 10"
I'm convinced Blue Sabbath Black Cheer's 'Dried Up Corpse' is about me on a Saturday morning.... Anyway it is a 10" on Gnarled Forest of black ambient doom that's very cinematic and has me thinking of Lustmord. The other side builds on the previous side with deep sub bass rumblings with layers of white noise. Business lady thinks it sounds like stormy weather. It's what I imagine Skeletor has on his skullpod. Ltd and in screen printed jackets. I've just realised this is a splitrecord between Blue Sabbath Black Cheer and Dried Up Copse but not to worry, you get the idea kids.
 
From The Sound Projector: Blue Sabbath Black Cheer / Dried Up Corpse split 10"
The 10inch item features two untitled pieces and is released on Reed’s own label Gnarled Forest Recordings (GF25). The BSBC side is, once again, slow, dark, evil and seeping despair from every one of its ill-lit corners. Much “simpler” than either of the above pieces, this achieves its effects through fewer combined sounds and a little more chilly air circulating in its overall audio space. Like taking a midnight bathe in freezing sewage. Dried Up Corpse win the prize for the most memorable name of grisliness on this page, and offer a very dessicated sound, like a thousand sheets of sandpaper flying through a howling wind. Uncomfortable rather than painful, they still remain extremely abrasive.

From The Sound Projector: BSBC/Penetration Camp - Bleak Village : Mob Rules split LP
On Bleak Village…Mob Rules (DRUG-FRONT PRODUCTIONS NO NUMBER), we hear a growly and sullen mope from Reed and Rage, filled with large amounts of implied menace. Slow, dark and nasty, their two tracks ‘Paranoid’ and ‘Elektrisches Begräbnis’ unspool with the calm but fierce deliberation which John Wiese can also do so convincingly. On the flip, Penetration Camp (a repellent name, that; somehow conflating concentration camps with rape) perform ‘Mob Rules’ at 45rpm, a piece which starts off with a few bleak, desolate clangs as of some lone soldier’s canteen dangling hopelessly from barbed wire. This is just a taster for the insufferable sounds of torture which ensue, comprising screaming, yelling and the sound of remorseless hammers smashing limbs. A painful nightmare reinforced by a grisly colour painting insert. Gerald Hansen recorded this duo who trade as M and ~dyna*girl.

From Crucial Blast : Blue Sabbath Black Cheer / Dried Up Corpse split 10". This split originally came out as an extremely limited cassette on the label What We Do Is Secret in a run of just 50 copies; Gnarled Forest have resurrected it onto vinyl for the rest of us shlubs who missed out on the tape, pressing up 300 copies of this record on black vinyl and packaging it in a 10" sleeve with minimal silkscreened black and white artwork and a thick cardstock insert that's covered with rad-looking skulls. Can never get enough skulls, you know? This is a great teamup between one of my favorite avant-industrial-blacksludge duos, Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, and their buddies in Dried Up Corpse, who dredge up their own brand of blackened noise-soaked dirge...
Blue Sabbath starts this off with an untitled side-long track, and it's one of the most laid back recordings that I've heard from the band. As laid back as Blue Sabbath gets of course, and it's still an evil, feedback-laden, demonic freenoise abomination like the rest of their catalog, only here the band dials back on the grating noise and the pummeling fucked-up rhythmic elements, instead taking their blackened drones and moaning vocal horror and murky ambience and smearing it all into a more muted and ambient take on their sound, spreading it out into an expansive cavernous droneworld filled with far-off foghorn like blasts, snatches of eerie buried melody, the monstrous vocals stretched and smeared into indistinct rumblings, deep subterranean thrum vibrating up out of the depths, everything swaddled in a haze of electronic filth and droning feedback. These sounds are melted together into a hallucinatory demonic drift that never gets all of that aggressive until the very end when the deep, gutteral death metal like vocals start to creep out the cracks, and it's one of the band's most desolate, isolationist recordings yet.
On the other hand, Dried Up Corpse goes for total deathdrone approach, unleashing a nasty slab of blown out locust-swarm and churning corrosive drone. The track begins with a series of deep, rumbling pulsations that then erupt into an almost wall-noise attack of low-end white noise, fucked-up digital scrape, roaring forward like a black tide of toxic slime obliterating everything in it's path, until it dissipates into a subdued passage of chirping nocturnal insect-like noises and subterannean rumblings. Kinda like Bastard Noise being wiped out by The Rita, or something like that. Bottom line, it's a pretty cool dose of noxious deathdrone.

From Dusted : Crows Eat The Eyes From The Leviathans Carcass CD
Given the name of this Seattle duo, the tone of Blue Sabbath Black Cheer’s music isn’t hard to predict. But save a predilection for the dark and heavy side of sound, there ain’t many similarities with its namesakes. Stan Reed and WM. Rage certainly don’t rock; instead, they make ominous (some might argue ubiquitous) noise. Crows Eat the Eyes from the Leviathan’s Carcass compiles seven tracks from the duo’s past, including a few previously unreleased, into almost 45 minutes of unsurprisingly grim material. To be fair, Blue Sabbath Black Cheer are hardly novices when it comes to ear damage. Rage and Reed have been playing together since 2005, and both men performed and recorded in other noise groups previous to BSBC. But to be frank, their sound is almost cliché in current noise circles. That isn’t to say that what Release the Bats termed “horror noise” is a style that needs extermination; after all, the tenets of garage rock have remained rather stationary throughout decades. What this does mean, though, is that as time passes, and ears grow more and more accustomed to such a sound, that increasingly noteworthy efforts are required to rise above the average muck and mire.
When Crows Eat the Eyes from the Leviathan’s Carcass is at its best, this goal is achieved. The disc’s untitled second track sounds like a murky trip below the surface of the River Styx, and the fifth track, also nameless, explores the noisy underpinnings of a baleful ambience before it suffers its demise at the hands of rusty metallic whine and squeal. The aforementioned tracks are not only two of the album’s most subtle, they’re also the only previously unreleased material included.
Blue Sabbath Black Cheer aren’t all tone and drone, however, and there’s plenty on Crows Eat the Eyes... with teeth. In this case, those fangs tend to ravage the band’s most appealing traits. It’s more effective on “Maggot” to hear the beast grumble, growl and rattle its chains than to experience its full fury, as on the album’s opening track. Reed and Wage work best when they work hard – that is, when they maintain an eye for detail, textures and atmosphere. This can be obscured by all the howling and squealing, so next time out, hopefully they’ll focus more on the small things and leave much of the crude stuff to those with a less deft touch.

From Vital Weekly : Crows Eat the Eyes From the Leviathans Carcass CD
Very funny - black on black printing - I have also just received a USB release whose accompanying text was microscopic- but advertised itself as audio/software made in part by hackers - kind of poison pie factory product? Do they honestly think I'll run the thing - well I will but not on this c09$%^5645860&^%8er. CETFTLC is essentially horror movie soundtracks kind of thing. Ambient soundscapes. It documents several previous releases with newer material. I've mentioned this before but there does seem to be in the USA an interest in horror of this kind which might be genuine? It doesn't cross the Atlantic well, and I suspect it's a cultural phenomenon. Those of us who live in Europe are aware of a history which does go back to real dark ages,  a village I once lived near still has the stocks, where I live now has a water pump in the square which served also a lockup - (prison) and supports a metal beacon for warning and celebrating, the pub opposite when re-decorated a Childs boot was found up a chimney and its common to find under old doorsteps dead / buried cats. I think maybe some Americans (not natives) feel cut off from this past, and it makes my review therefore difficult. CETFTLC sounds fairly gentle- not particularly frightening, but I want to pay it respect in case it is serious. Here they appear like the fun fare ghost train and joke shop novelties, but then that's perhaps because you can in Europe glimpse the "real thing." Though places like  Warminster have a certain reputation its really old hippies and crystals, but I remember once visiting Ashby de-la Zouch in Leicestershire - an area known for active serious witchcraft, and visiting a magic shop off the high street was not funny, hippy or amusing. Not that there might be any real supernatural events - that doesn't prevent the occult violence that does take place in communities across the UK, that is real enough. But then the label is from  Gothenburg -  in Sweden which further complicates the matter. So is it some pesky kids joke, but even then in the non-supernatural there is a psychology of unconscious archetypes -  so its either harmless nonsense or harmful nonsense - so be careful there.

From Brainwashed : Crows Eat the Eyes From the Leviathans Carcass CD. Humorous though their name may be, Blue Sabbath Black Cheer actually sounds like anything but. Primarily the duo of wm.Rage and Stan Reed, this collection pulls from several out of print releases while also adding two unreleased tracks. Call this fine collection a "best of" if you want, but be warned: this is some brutal material. Perhaps "best of the worst" would be more apt.
Let it be known though that these two do what they do extremely well. The seven tracks presented here each see the duo expanding the definition of blackness, seeking out its various manifestations and finding new examples lying between the cacophonic blood-boiling noise found on the first untitled track and the brooding and spare scrape soundscapes found on the second track, also untitled.
More or less everything else here falls somewhere in the middle of these two approaches, the duo always finding new ways to intermingle their gutteral vocals, oscillators, tapes, guitar and bass. "Genocide" finds a vocal bellow on par with some dinosaurs while high-end oscillators ring about in richly textured pools of mud. It may be harsh but the layers intermingle fabulously, and even the noise newcomer could find elements of interest to lose themselves in here. It is one of the finest demonstrations of the group's sound presented on the disc. "Maggot" crackles like coals sizzling in some lava pit in Sumatra while avalanches roll about above. The sound is certainly an ugly one, but ambient elements are present, and the sheer level of action keeps the piece on its toes throughout.
Whereas many of the tracks here feel like a compactor squishing various noise tactics into one another, the fifth untitled track is truly a dark ambient work, gliding along menacingly while wagon wheels and feedback shoot shards of color into the piece, if only momentarily. The patient control exhibited is one of the group's strengths, as they exhibit their interest in unified works rather than all out blow-you-away noise. The centerpiece of the disc is no doubt found in the 17-plus minute "Borre Fen/Untitled." Beginning in a drifting netherworld of screeching tapes, the piece builds from musique concrete openings into a bleak post-apocalyptic portrait before descending into complete bone-sucking mayhem. The work moves through so many spaces that it is difficult to touch on all of them, though it does take the shape of a mini score of sorts, each scene represented with fine dexterity and finesse. The closing untitled track is a harsh high end palette cleanser, securing the group's position as dark noise practitioners of the highest degree, far more closely aligned to artists such as Cousins of Reggae or Spykes than Sunn 0))) or even Robedoor.

From Aquarius : Blue Sabbath Black Cheer  /  Dried Up Corpse split 10"
Originally released as a super limited cassette (only 50 copies), this 10" (also way too limited at 300 copies) teams up our favorite demonic duo, with the awesomely monickered Dried Up Corpse for some deep dire noise drenched heaviness.
The BSBC side is about the prettiest thing they've ever done, which means it's still vile and sick and murky and ominous and fucked up, it's just that it's not so harsh, more muted and blurred and black ambient, than some of their other outings. A sprawling deeeeeeeeep doomscape, creeping black rumbles, demonic gurgles, distant foghorn like melodies, bits of muted percussion, plenty of buzzing grit and distorted feedback, but all smeared and woozy and subterranean sounding, a darkly demonic drift, that infuses what might otherwise be warm shimmering blackened ambience, with some seriously abject miserablism and gloom.
Dried Up Corpse counter BSBC's sensitive side with a caustic chunk of chaotic crunch. Beginning with some deep whirring rumbles, the track soon splinters into full on blunted white noise, skittery and fractured and totally blown out, all the while underpinned by that initial rumbling whir, eventually the noise peels back leaving a long stretch of deep softened buzz to play us out. Gorgeous super thick hand screened sleeves, with nice two sided printed inserts.

From Aquarius - Crows Eat The Eyes From The Leviathans Carcass CD.
Finally, the very first cd release from Northwestern blacknoize terrorists Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, not a proper full length exactly, more a collection of odds and ends, a selection of out of print tracks, culled from various 7"s and 12"s and tapes, as well as a couple previously unreleased jams.
Those new to Blue Sabbath Black Cheer should definitely beware, the sound this dastardly duo conjure up is more noise than music, more drone than metal, yet it manages to be all of those things at once. They described their sound as "black acid bog death, blackened noise volume assault", and it most definitely is that, it's the sound of SUNNO))) and Wolf Eyes and Organum, mixed with black metal and dark ambience, power electronics and minimal dronemusic, and somehow molded into harsh and harrowing blackened buzzscapes, veering from full on caustic assault, to hushed mysterious creep, often in the same song.
One of the tracks here is from the Borre Fen lp, and of the various micro-releases represented here, that was the only one that we ever managed to get in the shop, which means for many folks, ourselves included, this is practically a new record.
From the opener "Untitled" (most of the tracks are titled "Untitled"!), a swirling buzzing cacophony of crumbling industrial whir, peppered with buried percussion, howled voices lost in the mix, keening sheets of feedback, and a fierce white noise blow out, to the follow up "Untitled", a much more minimal, bit of cinematic drift, still pretty ominous and spooky, but here it's about the drone, and the strange processed gurgling sounds underneath, the heartbeat like pulse, the fragmented melodies and the overall hellish vibe, to another "Untitled", another wash of minimal scrape and creak and groan and grind, shot through with minor key moodiness, and wreathed in warm layers of deeeeeeep whirring rumble.
The record's centerpiece is the 17+ minute track from Borre Fen, which oozes to the surface, a long death march trawl some bleak black underworld of sound, a roiling pit of blackness and despair, thick layers of black drone, processed tapes, field recordings, disembodied voices processed into still more drones, distant streaks of feedback, gurgled grunted 'vocals', rumbling, grinding stretches of abstract sound, fragments of melody drifting in a churning black sonic sea, creepy and dark and desolate and downtuned and very very evil. Besides the above mentioned bands, we also hear bits of Lustmord, Stalaggh, Wolf Eyes, Za Frumi (mostly for the Orc like vocals), Abruptum, Anenzephalia, MZ412...
The record finally finishes off with another "Untitled" track, which eschews all that low end for a 5 minute stretch of horror movie high end, stretched to its breaking point, some definite difficult listening, like some sort of boiling teapot / dog whistle dronejam, all over a grinding bit of crunchy rumble, finishing off the record, if not with a bang, then an ear piercing shriek.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES! Housed in super cool black on black cardboard sleeves, and for those that care, mastered by Herr Hans Grusel, of das infamous Krankenkabinet!

Friday, December 04, 2009 

Category: Music

Available now from Doom Mantra Records:

Blue Sabbath Black Cheer "Doom Mantra" LP, edition of 300
Comes in a silk screened cover with an insert and two sides of blisters.
We will be getting a limited amount of these here at Gnarled Forest so your best bet is to order directly from Doom-Mantra by contacting Jim, using the email: jim (at) noiseville (dot) com
$20.00 ppd USA / $27.00 ppd overseas


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Monday, November 02, 2009 

Category: Music
Available now from Gnarled Forest:

Please contact us at gnarledforest at hotmail dot com to check for availablity before sending your payment

Nihilist Assault Group & Blue Sabbath Black Cheer ‘Planned Obsolescence’ LP + ‘Obsolete’ split 7"- edition of 60 copies.
All out noise war collaboration LP between BSBC & NAG & split 7” featuring source materials from each group used in the collaboration. Pro-printed LP jackets / 11x11" insert / fold over 7" sleeve / 6x6" insert.
$20.00 ppd USA / $25.00 ppd Canada & Mexico / $33.00 ppd overseas

Nihilist Assault Group & Blue Sabbath Black Cheer ‘Planned Obsolescence’ LP, regular edition of 400 copies.
All out noise war collaboration LP between BSBC & NAG. Pro-printed LP jackets / 11x11" insert. Cover art by Dominic Black.
$17.00 ppd USA / $22.00 ppd Canada & Mexico / $29.00 ppd overseas

Nihilist Assault Group - Richard Rupenus, Mark Durgan & Michael Gillham
Blue Sabbath Black Cheer – wm.Rage, Stan Reed & Sean Dow

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Blue Sabbath Black Cheer & irr.app.(ext.) ’Skeletal Imposition’ c20, edition of 100 (GF33)
Part 1 in a trilogy of collaboration releases betwix these two groups; skeletal version of a song on the forthcoming LP, completely different mix. Cover art by Matt Waldron. Part 2 will be on CD, part 3 on LP, both due out late winter/early spring.
$7.00 ppd USA / $8.00 ppd Canada & Mexico / $10.00 ppd overseas

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Blue Sabbath Black Cheer / Sixes - split c20, edition of 100 (GF34)
BSBC “Pain Inflicted (Trauma)” – BSBC = Stan, wm., & Crystal. Recorded November 2008.
SIXES “Careful With That Axe, Eugene” - Live excerpts from the Pacific Northwest 2005
$7.00 ppd USA / $8.00 ppd Canada & Mexico / $10.00 ppd overseas

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Blue Sabbath Black Cheer / Rubber (O) Cement split c20, edition of 100 (GF35)
BSBC - selections from the upcoming “Doom Mantra” LP mixed with “Extra Hate” compliments of Scott Colburn
Rubber (O) Cement - All new madness from a mad mad hatter & crew...
$7.00 ppd USA / $8.00 ppd Canada & Mexico / $10.00 ppd overseas

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Thursday, September 24, 2009 

Category: Music
Available now from Debacle Records:

Various Artists - Bleak|Beauty CDr (DBL014)
A Seattle experimental compilation featuring:

Slates - Rainscatter
KRGA - Iku Tursus
Physical Demon - 8
Blue Sabbath Black Cheer - Untitled
Thunder Grey Pilgrim - Breathe Eon's Breadth
Forrest Friends - Daddy's Got the Clap
Wind Swept Plains - Vest of Vipers (got me all sad inside)
megabats - Purple Micron
Pig Heart Transplant - How to Survive in the Woods
Red Squirrels - My Bike is a Sailboat
Walrus Machine - Attic Stains
Summon Thrull - Even the Horses Were Cut in Half

This release is available from Debacle Records. Get in touch with them through their Myspace page or by emailing debaclerecords@gmail.com to order. Cost is 6.50ppd USA, ask Sam for international shipping rates.

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Tuesday, August 18, 2009 

Category: Music
New batch from Gnarled Forest

Please contact us at gnarledforest (at) hotmail (dot) com before sending payment to make sure that all the items you wish to order are available. Once your order has been confirmed, we do accept Paypal using the same email address.

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Blue Sabbath Black Cheer - Dead Death, Death Dead LP

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Edition of 500 copies. Split label release, Gnarled Forest (GF28) & Troubleman Unlimited (TMU208).
Side A features 2 live tracks originally released on the "Dead" c20 on Scumbag Tapes, a live version of 'Borre Fen' recorded at the Baltic Room in Seattle Washington on September 26th, 2006 & 'Black Acid' recorded live at the Funhouse in Seattle Washington on October 22nd, 2006.
Side B features 'Victim' recorded live at the Rebar in Seattle Washington on December 23rd, 2006, originally released on the "Feral Debris Vol. 2" CDr compilation + zine & a previously unreleased track recorded and mixed back in 2007.
Black vinyl, black hand stamped labels, comes housed in a pro-printed jacket with a gruesome spot varnished photograph by Stan Reed on the front. Includes an 11x11" insert.

$19.00 ppd USA / $23.00 ppd Canada & Mexico / $30.00 ppd overseas

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Nihilist Assault Group c20, edition of 100, (GF29)

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Four all new, all out nihilistic assault's on the senses. Personnel includes Richard Rupenus, Mark Durgan, Michael Gillham, Stan Reed & Wm Rage. Comes with an 11x17" b&w poster

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SOLD OUT


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Drowner - Irreversible/Absolute Negative c30, edition of 50, (GF30)

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From the front man of the What We Do Is Secret label comes 2 new bleak expressions of uncaring.

Sold Out

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Dried Up Corpse / Numb Erone split c30, edition of 50, (GF31)

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Dried Up Corpse dissects itself once again with a blistering blackend blending of noise and hate that can only come as expected. Numb Erone is none other than Leslie Nichols-Rage. This recording comes from her first solo live performance on May 9th, 2009 with additional mixing by Wm Rage.

Sold Out

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Friday, May 29, 2009 

Category: Music
Blue Sabbath Black Cheer / Dried Up Corpse split 10" vinyl, edition of 300 copies.

Originally released as a c16 on What We Do Is Secret in an edition of 50 copies. Two bleak and desolate trips to despairsville are what await you here, BSBC take a more minimulist approach to horror than the usual roar, sure to make you a bit uneasy as your led into the fog. DUC ride a slow drone of death into the winds of the end. Comes housed in a screen printed jacket, front and back, with a double sided insert.

$14.00 ppd USA / $17.00 ppd Canada & Mexico / $23.00 ppd overseas

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Dead Machines / Blue Sabbath Black Cheer split c24, edition of 100

Dead Machines, live at the 2006 Wooden Octopus Skull Experimental Musick pFestival in Seattle Wa, shrieking feedback and horror sounds. BSBC offer up a band new shitball of noise and terror designed for an empty sinking feeling.

$7.00 ppd USA / $8.00 ppd Canada & Mexico / $10.00 ppd overseas

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The Cherry Point / Dried Up Corpse split c26, edition of 100

The Cherry Point, also live from the 2006 Wooden Octopus Skull Experimental Musick pFestival with special guest The Rita joining in to make it extra crunchy and extra noisey. DUC give you a live one as well, recorded at the DisEaster Massturbation Sermon 2009 at ChickenHed Church in Seattle Wa.

$7.00 ppd USA / $8.00 ppd Canada & Mexico / $10.00 ppd overseas

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Paypal accepted using gnarledforest at hotmail dot com

Wednesday, April 22, 2009 

Category: Music
Monday, April 20, 2009 

Category: Music
Available now from Drugfront Productions

Blue Sabbath Black Cheer / Penetration Camp - Bleak Village Mob Rules split LP
A side features 2 brutal BSBC tracks recorded in 2006 playable at 33rpm. These tracks approach BSBC’s bog death sound from the perspective of the swarms of insects devouring a corpse. Not for fans of music. The B side features an incredible document of PC's demented despair playable at 45rpm. Not for fans of life.

Comes in a black LP jacket with screen printed back and glued on color front with 2 inserts inside and hand stamped labels.

Price is $15.00 ppd in the USA, $18.00 ppd Canada and Mexico, $24.00 ppd international. Paypal address is drugfrontproductions (at) gmail.com


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Friday, April 17, 2009 

Category: Music
Available now from Release The Bats

Blue Sabbath Black Cheer - Crows Eat The Eyes From The Leviathans Carcass CD: A collection of older, long out of print cuts and two previously unreleased tracks. Limited to 500 copies in a Stumptown Printers cardboard sleeve. Black on black print both on the cover and the disc. Artwerk and design by FEEDING. Mastering by Hans Grüsel.

Available now from Release The Bats by contacting trainstories (at) hotmail.com in Sweden

We here at Gnarled Forest will be getting our copies within the next week for easy USA ordering gnarledforest (at) hotmail.com

Tracklist: 1. Untitled. 2. Untitled. 3. Genocide. 4. Maggot. 5. Untitled. 6. Borre Fen/Untitled. 7. Untitled

Track 1 recorded live at Rotture, Portland, OR, May 19, 2007. Originally released on the “Eva” 7" by Daisy Cutter Records
Track 3 originally released on the split 7" with Pig Heart Transplant by Episcene ESR
Track 4 appears on the V/A "It's Battery Acid, You Slime" compilation cassette released by Heavy Psych
Track 6 originally released on the “Borre Fen” LP by What We Do Is Secret
Track 6 “untitled” is a collaboration with Anakrid. Originally released on the “Mutually Assured Destruction Vol. 1” LP by Black Horizons / PsychForm / Stereonucleosis Records
Track 7 originally released on the "untitled" LP by Troniks


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