Ark Tarp RecordsARK009
Pummeler/The North SeaAnother document from two well known silhouettes in new electronic music. Pummeler and The North Sea present an extreme adventure of violent FX explosions detailedly reflecting nature's rite of anger, eroding forests and heavy rain causing the soil to vanish from the flood. A complete degeneration followed by deep afterglows of slow-growing sound cycles and dysthopic synthesizers oozing, flowing and drowning.
Reviews:
"Ark Tarp is one of the most creatively brilliant labels out there. They release CD-Rs from some incredible artists that are dressed to the nines in carefully crafted handmade bundles with an emphasis on visuals via art cards. They just offered to the world a bundle of three new releases that are close to selling out, each limited to fifty copies. This release in particular is absolutely stunning. It comes in a hand painted cardboard case with paste-on art including seven hand cut, pro-printed photo inlays and a text inlay printed on recycled paper. Each inlay has a patterned photograph that brings to mind the audible patterns on the disc. Using all seven, it’s kind of a neat synaesthetic experience to figure out which portions of the tracks match up best with each photo card. This gem out of the three new releases is a smart split between two well-known and established artists, Pummeler and our own Brad Rose’s The North Sea. Both exhibit some of their most fine-tuned skills on this release.
Each artist gives us one new twenty-three-minute track. Seriously, both tracks are almost the exact same length. Pummeler goes first with “Pachacuti” and puts us in the passenger seat down an express lane through blistering effects. Heavy on a constant downpour of fuzzy texture, different crashes, rings, vocals, swirls, dings, and such are thrown at you and are absorbed into the rocky caverns of static noise. It spirals out into an almost drill-like frenzy towards the last third of the track. The ride is over, the seat belt unclicks, and you’re fine to go. Then its The North Sea’s turn with “In Your Teeth,” which has a warped out spacey ring to it and another effect that kind of dances around and it all disappears and gives way to a rising and falling of what sounds like a rocket engine revving and a hovering synth drone that orbits over extraterrestrial landscapes. Effects are added to the mix, like tenacious tentacles, a rapidly shifting siren, and space probe-like beams that fire away. Totally an intergalactic treasure. A little different from what I remember from this particular project before, but then again, Rose is constantly on the move. There you have it, two unforgettable tracks in one unbelievable package. 9/10"
- Foxy Digitalis 2011
"Pummeler is Dane Mikkel Dunkerley and on here he contributes one long track of synth disintegration. The North Sea's explorations of weird synth-scapes continues with this lengthy track that mixes a background of infernal tape-wowing hum with spiralling oscillations. Excellent hand-made packaging too."
- Boa Melody Bar 2011
