Alienation through Pain
Cyclic Meditation [Voyage through Hybris]
Transgression
Violation [Beyond boundaries]

Sex sells. Always has. Always will. Stick a picture of a half / fully naked woman on the cover of a recording and no matter how shite the music some pervy sucker will buy it. Sad but true. Sexual fetishes are all the rage just now. The bondage Master / Servant scene…so long kept underground…is now in vogue in a big way. Respected American / European…and in particular Japanese artists…are now in the forefront of using images of trussed up men and women to make mega bucks. This fetish scene has already been infiltrated in music by the likes of Die Form and Sleep Chamber with their, quite frankly, hideous mix of plodding EBM and dull electronic soundscapes . ZZZZZZ. The time is ripe for some new blood to appear to enrich the lives of the musically sexually frustrated masses.

Released on the Void Rekordz label…an independent label primarily dealing in limited edition CDRs…Kult have been around since 2002 and this is their fourth release. The main founder…and Void Rekordz head honcho…is one Raven-B. This split recording with Humiliation is limited to 80 copies and comes housed in a DVD case with a black & white photo of a handcuffed shackled woman. I imagine a few of you drooling already. Sad fucks. Both acts contribute two tracks apiece and the recording lasts for just over 40 minutes. The Kult tracks are titled ‘Alienation through pain’ and ‘Cyclic Meditation’ and are geared towards the old type Industrial rhythmic noise / Power Electronics spectrum of music. Taken as such both tracks sit comfortably with similar such recordings currently available. The use of samples…a little bit of swearing, someone getting their arse beaten to a pulp…works well in conjunction with the heavy repetitive pounding dynamics…loved the road drill in there…and they even match a little black ambience and distorted noise to great effect.

Humiliation on the other hand go for a more experimental electronics black ambient atmosphere with their two tracks ‘Transgression’ and ‘Violation’. Being the longest track, at 16 minutes duration, ‘Transgression’ slowly builds with a gurgling bleeping static interference piece, with occasional thumps and bumps thrown in for good measure, that’s very entertaining although by no means unique. The second track is more musically orientated with a more ominous dark edge to it. Looped synth lines are the foundation on which outer worldly layers are skilfully grafted. On the strength of these two passages the future looks bright for Humiliation.

Taken overall this split release acts as a showcase for what might be for both acts in the future. Having not heard the previous Kult recordings I’m unsure whether the two tracks here represent their music as an evolvement or merely a marking time on their progression. Still good stuff though…and if nothing else the cover will sell it alone.

ANM