Merzbow / Genesis P-Orridge – A Perfect Pain (1999)

January 20, 2020

Considering the weight that both of these names bring in the noise, industrial and power electronics world, this collaboration record is unfortunately a bit of a mixed bag. The noise is brooding and atmospheric, with the odd ear piercing flourish. Genesis’ “vocals” however, massively take me out of the whole thing.

I get it, it’s noise. It’s not uncommon to have vocals distorted. But when the pace is so slow and deliberate, as with most of the tracks here, and the tracks are spoken word passages rather than conventional lyrics, you’d expect to be able to hear at least half of what is going on. It reminds me of listening to longwave radio: kinda cool, but also kinda fucking pointless.