Merzbow/Genesis P-Orridge

A PERFECT PAIN - Merzbow/Genesis P-Orridge [CSR23CD]. Available from Cold Spring Records, 8 Wellspring, Blisworth, Northants., NN7 3EH, England.

NO wonder this CD sold out before it was even released. This is probably the best Industrial recording of the decade. The former (?) Psychic TV and Throbbing Gristle front man, Gen P, returns for a brilliant collaboration with Japan’s leading purveyors of extreme Noise. Lavishly packaged, the first track - A Perfect Restraint - has the pounding spin-dryer effects of Merzbow winding alongside Gen’s ever monotonous (but never dull) vocals. But the choice cut on this juicy offering has to be the exhilarating Flowering Pain Give Space, a wet electronic slap in which the listener is treated to a cynical ode to the nervous, the sickly and the compulsive biter of nails. Source Are Rare also deals with fear, and even more so with suffocation, re-possession and being taken over both physically and mentally. But how can one truly express the 20-minute technological wizardry of Merzbow in words? On this track, the metallic din from the land of the rising sun is given free rein, proving that this is in no way an attempt to make Merzbow appear more palatable to the average PTV fan (as if we’re not already used to extremities!). In fact unlike what I was expecting this is not just a Psychic TV recording with Merzbow conveniently relegated to a minor backing role. This is a very balanced CD and both sets of fans will be more than satisfied with what has been achieved. And what are we to make of the next pedantic bout of sneery sarcasm?: “I suggest discussing and thinking about and visualising the kreeme horne. I hope you understand what a kreeme horne might be?” Well up until now I thought a Kreeme Horne was something lying covered with wasps in your local bakers’ shop window. Seems it has a more philophical meaning. All Beauty Is Our Enemy sounds like the frustrated war-cry of the ugly, and ugly indeed are the implications of these Noise-infested lyrical stanzas: “Ah, my friends, these are needfully sadistic times, pettiness rules each day and blatant corruption is emblazoned in the highest places”. Hmm, sounds about right to me. This is a whistle-stop journey through the redded tooth and claw of Natural Selection, where the strong survive and the weak are incapable of stemming the bloody flow that Masami Akita has induced from their beleagured eardrums. A long-awaited masterpiece.