Heard his name being mentioned here and there, but his discography is a mammoth being. So where start? Should I even start?
Any help would be greatly appreciated
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Merzbird
Wrong answer.
Allmusic to the rescue!
http://tinyurl.com/5oruvd
He's pretty awesome if you're in the right mood, and pretty annoying if you're not. Live, he was incredible... Venereology is pretty ace, I likes.
depends how you feel about NOISE
The records he releases on his own are like nothing else on earth - pure total NOISE, no vesitge of melody or anything you'd traditionally think of as music. Pretty fucking challenging stuff. As someone's already mentioned, you've got to be in a very particular mood for it or you'll end up with a migrane. Check out 'Pulse Demon' or 'Venerology' if this floats your boat.
Alternatively, if you don't want to abandon yourself totally to noise, check out some of his collaborations - especially with Boris. Personally I love 'sun baked snow cave' where you get the Merzbow noise but also some more traditional instrumentation and it all blends together to actually become very relaxing.
people tend to say
1930
merzzow
venerology
pulse demon
but i don't believe there is a 'best' release to start with and there is definitely no right or wrong answer. releases i enjoy include some of the following:
minazo vol. 2
pornoise 1kg series
rainbow electronics II
higanbana
here
also in terms of collaborations, the two john wiese collabs are particularly brutal, as well as the one with genesis p. orridge, which is quite eerie and must be heard!
where do you stand on 'electric dress'?
I'm enjoying it but it's not nearly as brutal as I was expecting.
i've yet to hear it unfortunately,
however i like 'synth destruction,' thats a great collab with carlos giffoni.
whats it like?
well it's an odd one...
It isn't nearly as harsh as pulse demon et al but it doesn't have the 'traditional song structure' stuff that his work with Boris does.
If anything it feels more cerebal than most Merzbow, more like an intellectual exercise in sound manipulation than the usual visceral rip your throat out stuff. It hasn't yet sent me into that 'aural trip' that you sometimes get when you play Merzbow loud and you enter this peaceful closed off zone (did that make any sense, hard to describe really?)
haha, what am i thinking
asking someone to describe a merzbow record over the internet! but still, very good job - i (kind of) know what you mean!
did you catch the live performance in london earlier this year?
sadly not - I would love to hear (feel?) how it comes across live
My favourite Merzbow experience thus far has been when I was covering a Yr11 lesson in a computer room. They were all playing 'rnb' shite on their computer monitors and it sounded like a complete cacophony. I asked them nicely to turn it down. They didn't. I said 'I warn you, I can drown it out' They called my bluff and I played venerology through the IWB speakers. They lasted about 10 seconds and then they begged me to turn it off and gave me no more trouble for the rest of the lesson.
good one,
they need a proper education - a merzducation.