Paik
"Satin Black" CD
Strange
Attractors Audio House
Genres: drone metal, psychedelia, instrumental
Strange Attractors
PO Box 13007
Portland OR 97213
Sep 26 - Oct 3 2004 |
How do you describe an album like this? Paik's work falls
under the instrumental drone rock banner, but it is so noisy and
aggressive that I can't help thinking it would make for one pretty
messed up acid trip. Right off the get-go, Satin Black is
an aural assault - "Jaynefield" opens with a brooding guitar
line to set things up, before jumping into a chugging,
metal-influenced slab of rock. It's actually surprisingly
accessible, as Paik seems content to wait awhile before heading
into the more experimental realm of feedback and drone. Second
track "Dirt For Driver" covers that base - it's an
uplifting, echoing hunk of psych-metal abstraction. Riffs keep
things vaguely structured, but as a whole it's a pretty atmospheric
piece of music. "Satin Black," at fifteen minutes, finally drops off the
deep end; a dreamy work of acid drone, it makes no apologies and
doesn't even pretend to be accessible. What starts off with a
distinct rhythm and a growling bass riff eventually disintegrates into
a reverberating, chaotic hollowness. Every semblance of melody
is buried so deep in the mess you'd need a pneumatic drill to extract
it. "Dizzy Stars," meanwhile, is sludgy and
suffocating - a descent into the netherworlds of existence. The
haunting, beatless "Stellar Meltdown En El Oceano" finishes things up
in pure ambient drone territory.
Paik makes powerful drone metal music that is worth a listen
if you're into the instrumental psychedelia noise genre. Despite
all the feedback and chaos, they are still considerably more
accessible than most acts working under the same genre, and will
therefore make for a fine introductory course. Satin Black is
apocalyptic fun.
85%
Matt Shimmer [Vitals:
5 tracks, distributed by the
label, released 2004] |
