Well, the record came out. Author & Punisher‘s Krüller (review here) was released Feb. 11 on Relapse — as was foretold by the mysterious transient prophets of the PR wire — and I can only assume it’s been turning brains into goo in the less-than-a-week’s-time since. It continues to do such to me, anyhow. I feel like I can almost go a full day at this point without putting it on, and that’s since last month when the promo came through. The video below, for second track “Incinerator,” is no small part of what makes that an “almost” situation.

The clip, as you’ll see, is strobe-tastic, so if you’re sensitive to flashing lights, be aware. And the song — which it’s kind of funny to think is working off the same metaphor as Jefferson Starship‘s “We Didn’t Start the Fire” — runs through a litany of current happenings any number of which might be overwhelming when considered on their own, but taken together indeed feel like a kiln, pressure cooker, or anything else you might want to think of that burns, condenses, and ultimately destroys when left unchecked. “Incinerator” it is. Certainly there are enough fires around at any given point to make the argument, and as Author & Punisher‘s Tristan Shone is based in San Diego, the state of California’s permanent-wildfire-season strikes as particularly relevant here, though the lyrics also cover civil unrest, family separation, and human complicity in all of it.

Feelgood it ain’t, unless you’re counting expressive catharsis, which I am. You’ll see below that Author & Punisher have a slew of mostly-Euro tour dates announced and probably more to come, and if you haven’t heard the record yet, the full stream is at the bottom of the post. I think I’ll go ahead and put it on right now. Again. Because it’s fucking incredible.

Believe it:

Author & Punisher, “Incinerator” official video

Author & Punisher have released a video for “incincerator” as the San Diego-based outfit’s new album, Krüller, arrives via Relapse Records (https://orcd.co/authorandpunisher-kruller).

“’Incinerator’ is about outrage and urgency. The world is actually on fire,” offers Tristan Shone. “We are dealing with extreme conditions of a warming climate yet face brutal resistance by those who want to deflect our rage towards each other for their profit. Special thanks to Director Ansel Wallenfang and DP James Rexroad who worked tirelessly to translate this rage into a visual adventure/nightmare.”

Tour dates:
March 6 Los Angeles, CA Resident
March 8 Seattle, WA Clock Out Lounge
March 9 Portland, OR Hawthorne Theater (Lounge)
March 10 Oakland, CA Elbo Room Jack London
March 28 Warsaw, Poland Hydrozagadka
March 29 Wroclaw, Poland Akademia
March 30 Prague, Czech Republic Modra Vopice
March 31 Bratislava, Slovakia Randal Club
April 1 Zagreb, Croatia Mocvara
April 2 Linz, Austria Kapu
April 3 Luzern, Switzerland Sedel
April 4 Milan, Italy Legend Club
April 5 Montpellier, France The Black Sheep
April 6 Barcelona, Spain Bóveda
April 7 Toulouse, France L’Ecluse Saint Pieere
April 9 Poitiers, France Le Confront Moderne
April 11 Antwerp, Belgium Kavka
April 13 Vilnius, Lithuania Gallery 1986
April 14 Riga, Latvia Melna Piektdiena
April 15 Tallin, Estonia Sveeta Bar
April 16 St. Petersburg, Russia Latochka
April 17 Moscow, Russia Bumazhnaya Fabrika
Mvtant opens March 28 to April 11

May 11 Albuquerque, NM Launchpad
May 14 Austin, TX Elysium (Oblivion Access Festival)
May 18 Denver, CO Hi-Dive
May 19 Salt Lake City, UT Metro Music Hall
May 20 Las Vegas, NV Backstage Bar
May 22 San Diego, CA Casbah

w/Perturbator & Health:
October 6 Lille, France Aeronef
October 7 Paris, France L’Olympia
October 12 Bordeaux, France Krakatoa
October 13 Toulouse, France Bikini
October 14 Madrid, Spain La Riviera
October 15 Barcelona, Spain Razzmatazz 2
October 16 Nantes, France Stereolux
October 18 Lyon, France Le Transbordeux
October 19 Strasbourg, France La Laiterie
October 20 Lausanne, Switzerland Les Docks
October 21 Munich, Germany Freiheiz
October 22 Vienna, Austria, Arena
October 23 Budapest, Hungary Akvarium Nagyhall
October 25 Prague, Czech Republic Lucerna Music
October 26 Wroclaw, Poland Zaklete Rewiry
October 27 Warsaw, Poland Progresja
October 28 Berlin, Germany Heimathafen
October 29 Göthenburg, Sweden Trädgår’n
October 30 Stockholm, Sweden Berns
November 1 Helsinki, Finland Tavastia
November 3 Oslo, Norway Vulkan Arena
November 4 Copenhagen, Denmark Pumpehuset
November 5 Hamburg, Germany Uebel & Gefährlich
November 6 Utrecht, Netherlands Tivoli
November 8 Cologne, Germany Kantine
November 9 Esch-Sur-Alzette, Luxembourg Rockhal
November 10 Brussels, Belgium Ancienne Belgique

Author & Punisher, Krüller (2022)

Author & Punisher on Facebook

Author & Punisher on Instagram

Author & Punisher on Twitter

Author & Punisher on Bandcamp

Author & Punisher website

Relapse Records website

Relapse Records on Facebook

There’s a lot going on here. A lot to unpack, in the parlance of our times, but I’m gonna keep it short because I always feel like I screw these posts up by making it more than the list of bands and encouragement and thanks for listening that it should be. Hey, guess what? I think the songs I picked for the show I made don’t suck. If that wasn’t going to be the case, why would I pick them?

As for the voice breaks here, I barely remember what I said other than I was awkward. My wife was giving our son a bath at the time and I was worried he tub sounds would show up in the recording. That’s my rock and roll lifestyle. I’ve been considering a cocaine addiction so I can convince myself I’m fun again. Maybe go to a show.

Thanks for listening. Or reading. Whatever, really. Just thanks.

The Obelisk Show airs 5PM Eastern today on the Gimme app or at: http://gimmemetal.com.

Full playlist:

The Obelisk Show – 02.04.22

The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal airs every Friday 5PM Eastern, with replays Sunday at 7PM Eastern. Next new episode is Feb. 18 (subject to change). Thanks for listening if you do.

Gimme Metal website

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Safe to say the world has not grown less dystopian since Tristan Shone, otherwise known as the auteur of industrial doom forebear outfit Author & Punisher, last released an LP. The eight-song/52-minute Krüller, Author & Punisher‘s second full-length for Relapse Records and upwards of seventh overall depending on who counts what as what, wholly and on multiple levels confronts the time and place of its creation, operating in a swath of voices from the post-apocalyptic vigilante of “Centurion” to the subversive gender play of the Portishead cover “Glorybox” and the menacing narrator of “Incinerator” who sees not only the rising temperatures and waters of man-made climate change but the everyday horrors of police brutality, the separation and detention of immigrant families, and the overwhelming sensory onslaught of the media sphere, the latter channeled also through the dance freneticism of Shone‘s collaboration with producer Jason “Vytear” Begin on the penultimate “Blacksmith,” which accounts lyrically for a myriad of losses in a voice less judgmental than also-mourning. Much as there’s condemnation to go around, there’s also an abundance of sadness.

Some love, too, particularly on “Maiden Star,” and all of this refined focus on lyrics comes filtered through the vast, sometimes harsh, dense-gravity futurist sci-fi noisescape that along with his machination-based live presentation has made Author & Punisher the most influential purveyor of industrial music since Nine Inch Nails a generation (and then some) ago. Those who came aboard with 2018’s more outwardly aggressive Beastland (discussed here) will note some distinct shifts in approach. Shone, still seemingly able to make electronic beats sound ‘heavier’ in the doomed sense of the word — i.e. weighted low end tonality, manifest in drone and slamming impacts sounding like they were tipped off by mid/late-’90s Meshuggah — makes what feels like a conscious decision to incorporate more guitar, with parts written by Phil Sgrosso of Apathian and As I Lay Dying (Doug Sabolik of Ecstatic Vision will play live), as well as melodic vocals from Shone himself and, on the aforementioned “Maiden Star,” from his wife, Marilia Maschion.

‘Clean’ singing as opposed to barking shouts, screams, etc., is a longstanding part of Shone‘s repertoire, and featured throughout the 2018 album too, but it’s a matter of adjusting priorities, and Krüller is easily the most melodic and complex work he has done vocally. There are hints, as in the beginning of “Incinerator” or “Blacksmith,” or even the post-intro verse of the title-track, that brush up against goth dramaturge in the delivery, and perhaps a bit of nostalgia in “Incinerator” as a past is mourned: “I think back/We survived on much less/A place lost/a dead wind/The smell of our flesh,” with the last of those lines subsumed in the swell of volume that takes hold. Still, the overarching mood of the record is dark and plenty challenging and the angriest parts of “Misery,” “Incinerator,” “Centurion” and the closing title-track more than live up to the ethos of authorial punishment. Again, it is a balance that has been retooled. The vocals enhance the lyrics — and admittedly, the “refined focus” noted above may be due in part to the listener’s ability to discern what’s being said — and the lyrics act in kind.

It is early to make any such declarations, but Krüller is enough of an innovation for Author & Punisher — songwriting, performance, production, overall range of style — to be both a landmark for Shone as well as one of the year’s highlight studio achievements. That is to say, a contender for album of the year, with the obvious caveat of a lot of year to go. These songs are memorable unto themselves, but feed into the complete ambience that is first laid out in the eight-minute opener and longest track (immediate points) “Drone Carrying Dread,” in which every detail seems to matter and yet what all the details create is a floodlight of melody and atmosphere shining in your eyes through a chain link fence. When 2022 is done, Krüller will be one of its finest achievements.

No doubt the leadoff was chosen as the first single from the record (“Maiden Star” being the second supports this idea as well) in part to signal to Author & Punisher‘s audience some of the differences between Krüller and Beastland or, say, 2015’s Melk En Honig, which had plenty clean parts of its own, and the subsequent Pressure Mine EP worked off a balance not unlike Krüller, but with nowhere near the same production value here, but it also serves as an invaluable introduction to the world depicted in the material that follows. Without “Drone Carrying Dread” at the front, no doubt the lines “We wake up/We fall down/We break in/We face up/We crawl down/We wade in,” from the subsequent “Incinerator” would still be a standout hook, but the context in which they arrive would be missing. While it’s not as immediate as “Centurion” or “Misery” or “Maiden Star,” “Drone Carrying Dread” needs to be where it is for Krüller to function as it does. It’s the backstory and the setting in which the rest of the album’s story takes place, right down to the New Wave-y dream synth that “Maiden Star” echoes later on, seeming to blend that with the intensity of its beat, drawn from “Incinerator” and defying expectation at once.

Much has been and likely will continue to be made of the guest spots throughout Krüller, with Justin Chancellor and Danny Carey of pre-pandemic Author & Punisher tourmates Tool respectively adding bass to “Centurion” and drums to “Misery.” I won’t minimize the hi-hat and metal-snare ting on “Misery,” which is the shortest inclusion at 4:56 and arguably the most danceable, or the abiding thickness of “Centurion” that Shone seems to match in the chorus lines, ” Wait for the siege/Reborn centurion/American legion/Forlorn centurion,” by pushing his voice to a lower register — the second chorus of that song swaps “American legion” for “American lesion,” lest anyone doubt the critique at work on cartoonish manhood, the 2021 attempted overthrow of the US government, etc. — but even with the profile of those appearances, neither has as much affect in showcasing the expansion of Author & Punisher‘s reach as the prominence of Sgrosso‘s guitar or the three-dimensional-feeling layering between Shone and Maschion on “Maiden Star.” Whatever one might want to say about the incorporation of “organic” instrumentation in industrial music, it’s nothing new, and this material is powerful, consuming and as crushing as it wants to be regardless. As the first beats of “Krüller” itself take hold and Shone commands “Bow down to it,” there seems to be little option otherwise.

That is a particularly masculine idea of dominance, and it speaks to the engagement with gender and sexuality throughout the album. Even the structure of lyrics in “Krüller” that talk about holding up a truck that “pulls to the right” follow a sort of post-Hemingway speech pattern, in marked contrast to “Glorybox” earlier, the Portishead track on which “I just want to be a woman” and “Give me a reason to love you” are repeatedly crooned. One is left to wonder if a man can exist in that space, in those lines originally delivered by Beth Gibbons on 1994’s Dummy, without acting as colonizer, but as the hammer falls in “Blacksmith” and the electronic chaos takes hold ahead of the finale, there’s barely a second for the thought before it’s wiped away like, seemingly, everything else. If “Krüller,” then, is the aftermath of the album that shares its name, its initially Godfleshian opening is quickly broadened through its procession of verses (an Anne Rice reference tossed in for good measure) headed to the chorus that answers the ardent energy of “Glorybox” with an undercurrent of addiction malevolence, slow hip-hop cadence, brutal pounding and tension building all the while, likewise furious and methodical.

And in the ending, echoing some of the earlier goth-ness — many things sound like Type O Negative to me lately, the “whoa-oh”s at the finish of “Krüller” and some of the earlier vocals fit that bill as well — Shone moves from arguably the record’s most engrossing wash to an acid-test sample in which a woman, thoroughly dosed, tells her interviewer “I feel sorry for you.” These are the last words on Krüller, and they complete not only a picture begun earlier on the album’s expanse, but the sense of mourning that pervades so much of even the most bitter stretches throughout. If this era is to be defined by what’s been lost on individual as well as macro sociopolitical levels and what’s been gained and by whom, then Author & Punisher engages the moment with an unparalleled depth of craft, guiding the listener masterfully through each visionary piece that enriches the whole. Someone should put it in a time capsule so the future can know what it was like to be alive at the start of the 2020s. Recommended.

Author & Punisher, Krüller (2022)

Author & Punisher, “Maiden Star”

Author & Punisher, “Drone Carrying Dread” official video

Author & Punisher on Facebook

Author & Punisher on Instagram

Author & Punisher on Twitter

Author & Punisher on Bandcamp

Author & Punisher website

Relapse Records website

Relapse Records on Facebook

Yeah, this is a good one. A lot of this comes from stuff that’s been and is being covered around here over the last couple weeks, and suffice it to say I’ve got no regrets about choosing any of these tracks. I was worried about White Manna getting lost in the Quarterly Review shuffle, so consider this an extra nod to check that out, and celebrating the new Big Scenic Nowhere, Lamp of the Universe, Weedpecker and Pia Isa records feels about right, as well as the Electric Moon collection, Phase, which put “The Loop” right back in my head like it had never left.

Upcoming stuff from Seremonia, Obsidian Sea, Fostermother, and SÖNUS give a glimpse of things to be released over the next month-plus, and the hardest part about including an Author & Punisher track is not rambling incoherently for 20 minutes about how great the rest of the record from which it comes is. I suppose there will be time for such things.

For now, I thank you for listening as always if you do and I’m grateful you see these words either way.

The Obelisk Show airs 5PM Eastern today on the Gimme app or at: http://gimmemetal.com.

Full playlist:

The Obelisk Show – 01.21.22

The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal airs every Friday 5PM Eastern, with replays Sunday at 7PM Eastern. Next new episode is Feb. 4 (subject to change). Thanks for listening if you do.

Gimme Metal website

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The new Author & Punisher full-length, Krüller, is due Feb. 11 on Relapse and if 2022 ended today, it’d be my album of the year. Of course, 2022 doesn’t end today, but still. I had a review up for about 45 minutes this morning that was too early, but yeah, without delving into spoilers I guess, it’s a powerful record and the second single from it, “Maiden Star,” helps to show the uptick in melody that’s a big part of why.

Tristan Shone, the founding spearhead of the project, noted in the album’s announcement that he was looking to enact some kind of clarity in sound, which, given that the record was written over the course of post-pandemic 2020 doesn’t seem out of line as far as impulses go. “Maiden Star” is about as outwardly melodic as Krüller gets, and features a guest appearance from Marilia Maschion on backing vocals, who also happens to be Shone‘s wife.

“Maiden Star” follows and builds on the breadth of the first single “Drone Carrying Dread,” and I think you can hear some direct interaction between the two tracks in the use of dreamy, higher-floating synth notes as well. Here, those seem to willfully clash with hard-landing beats — also an Author & Punisher staple — that also draw from other material on the record. Or so I said in the review anyhow. I’ll post that in a couple weeks. Not looking to make trouble in the meantime.

Enjoy this, though. The album is something special.

Author & Punisher, “Maiden Star”

Author & Punisher unveil a second track from the outfit’s highly-anticipated new album, Krüller (Feb. 11, Relapse Records), with today’s release of the drone-drenched love song, “Maiden Star”.

Tristan Shone offers insight into the track and its place on the album: “’Maiden Star’ continues the trudge of escape and survival from ‘Drone Carrying Dread,’ but with a focus on the vital interpersonal conflicts and triumphs that exist in times of war and peace. This track, my personal favorite from the balance of the heavy and the melodic, is deeply personal and painful at the same time. The first note both lifts me up and beats the shit out of me.”

Krüller pre-orders are available now (https://orcd.co/authorandpunisher-kruller) with the 52-minute collection available on a selection of limited-edition vinyl variants that tie into the color palette of the album artwork, CD, cassette and digitally.

Author & Punisher has announced two rounds of 2022 European tour dates with a pair of North American performances slated for March.

Headlining dates:
February 7 Tallin, Estonia Sveta Bar
February 8 Riga, Latvia Melna Piektdiena
February 9 Vilnius, Lithuania XI 20
February 13 Antwerp, Belgium Kavka
February 14 Brighton, UK Patterns
February 15 London, UK The Underworld
February 16 Leeds, UK Brudenell Social Club
February 17 Glasgow, UK Stereo
February 18 Newcastle, UK Cluny
February 19 Birmingham, UK Castle and Falcon
February 20 Bristol, UK Fleece
February 21 Manchester, UK Deaf Institute

March 6 Los Angeles, CA Resident
March 10 Oakland, CA Elbo Room Jack London

w/ Perturbator and Health:
October 6 Lille, France Aeronef
October 7 Paris, France L’Olympia
October 12 Bordeaux, France Krakatoa
October 13 Toulouse, France Bikini
October 14 Madrid, Spain La Riviera
October 15 Barcelona, Spain Razzmatazz 2
October 16 Nantes, France Stereolux
October 18 Lyon, France Le Transbordeur
October 19 Strasbourg, France La Laiterie
Oxtober 20 Lausanne, Switzerland Les Docks
October 21 Munich, Germany Freheiz
October 22 Vienna, Austria Arena
October 23 Budapest, Hungary Akvarium Nagyhall
October 25 Prague, Czech Republic Lucerna Music
October 26 Wroclaw, Poland Zaklete Rewiry
October 27 Warsaw, Poland Progresja
October 28 Berlin, Germany Heimathafen
October 29 Goteborg, Sweden Tradgar N
October 30 Stockholm, Sweden Berns
November 1 Helsinki, Finland Tavastia
November 3 Oslo, Norway Vulkan Arena
November 4 Copenhagen, Denmark Pumpehuset
November 5 Hamburg, Germany Uebel & Gefahrlich
November 6 Utrecht, Netherlands Tivoli
November 8 Cologne, Germany Kantine
November 9 Esch-Sur-Alzette, Luxermbourg Rockhall
November 10 Brussels, Belgium Ancienne Belgique

Author & Punisher, Krüller (2022)

Author & Punisher, “Drone Carrying Dread” official video

Author & Punisher on Facebook

Author & Punisher on Instagram

Author & Punisher on Twitter

Author & Punisher on Bandcamp

Author & Punisher website

Relapse Records website

Relapse Records on Facebook

San Diego industrial doom innovator Author & Punisher will release the new album, Krüller, on Feb. 11 through Relapse Records. The solo outfit of Tristan Shone joins a crowded early-2022 sphere of outings, and he arrives with new machinations and new collaborations, as you can see detailed below. For those who would consume or otherwise be consumed by the follow-up to Author & Punisher‘s 2018 album, Beastland (discussed here), the new single “Drone Carrying Dread” brings an eight-minute introduction to the scope of Krüller, answering questions as to what depths Shone might conjure on the new release as well as the band’s overarching sonic progression and ongoing interplay between melodic resonance and rhythmic impact. A lot has happened in the world since 2018, and Beastland was a soundtrack for its time. Krüller‘s announcement brings immediately high expectations.

From the PR wire:

Author & Punisher – Krüller

AUTHOR & PUNISHER has returned with a mind-blowing new album in Krüller.

Wielding upgraded machines, a new sensory stratagem, and a crafty curation of top-tier collaborators, proprietor Tristan Shone emerged from the time off refined and re-tooled. Krüller is hoisted defiantly on breakouts “Incinerator,” “Drone Carrying Dread,” “Maiden Star,” but menaces profoundly on “Blacksmith,” “Centurion,” and the title track. These are anthems for the decay and self-absorption of today.

AUTHOR & PUNISHER’s unconventional yet assiduous methods with music and machine have landed critically acclaimed collaborations with many artists, including Perturbator’s James Kent, and Tool’s Danny Carey and Justin Chancellor, who appear on Krüller tracks “Misery” and “Centurion,” respectively.

To celebrate and invite musicians and creators into his visceral and tactile world, AUTHOR & PUNISHER is also launching a bespoke audio gear company called Drone Machines to coincide with the release of Krüller. The gear company launch follows nearly two decades of AUTHOR & PUNISHER honing in on his craft – meticulously inventing, machining, experimenting, and creating custom musical instruments for his incredible live performances and recordings.

Tracklisting:
1. Drone Carrying Dread
2. Incinerator
3. Centurion
4. Maiden Star
5. Misery
6. Glorybox
7. Blacksmith
8. Krüller

http://facebook.com/authorandpunisher
http://instagram.com/authorandpunisher
https://twitter.com/authorpunisher
http://www.authorandpunisher.com/
www.relapse.com
www.facebook.com/RelapseRecords

Author & Punisher, Krüller (2022)

Back to normal, such as it is, for The Obelisk Show. I did two songs in two hours last time and though it seemed to go over decently well in the chat, it was less welcomed by the station itself. Fair. I’ll readily admit that two hours of psychedelic improv is not going to be everybody’s cup of tea, even in a setting that supports extreme fare as a central ethic. I’m lucky they decided to air it. I’m lucky they let me do another episode.

In here you’ll find some more rocky stuff like Greenleaf and Formula 400. I’ve yet to really dig into the new Domkraft, so I wanted to give that a roll, and then the show gets into some heavier industrial stuff. Godflesh were talked about here last week, and Trace Amount, but some Sanford Parker and Author & Punisher too. I’ve had an itch lately that stuff has helped scratch. After that and Yawning Sons is my little homage to the Live in the Mojave Desert stream series. Mountain Tamer are on that this weekend and it’s well worth your time to search out. Of course, Earthless started that series so they’ll end the show here. Only fitting.

Thanks for listening and/or reading.

The Obelisk Show airs 5PM Eastern today on the Gimme app or at http://gimmemetal.com

Full playlist:

The Obelisk Show – 03.05.21

The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal airs every Friday 5PM Eastern, with replays Sunday at 7PM Eastern. Next new episode is March 19 (subject to change). Thanks for listening if you do.

Gimme Metal website

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The apocalyptic intensity conjured by San Diego one-man machine-doom/industrial outfit Author & Punisher has garnered praise far and wide over the better part of the last decade, and certainly the fact that Tristan Shone started the project over 15 years ago and has had a broad influence on the current heavy underground fascination with industrial sounds is a part of why. When it comes to artists and bands so hyped, as Author & Punisher has been at least since Ursus Americanus and Women & Children came out on Seventh Rule and more people began to experience it live, with Shone‘s homemade-or-at-least-workshop-made “drone machines” taking the place of instruments and serving rhythmic and melodic functions while he shouts into a custom vocal processor — quite a sight — my immediate response is to shut it out. The thing about most hyperbole? It’s bullshit. And very often it’s not so much about the artist involved as the person writing wanting to be ‘the one who said so.’ It is as much ego on the part of writer as it is plaudit of the work, and I think it’s gross. Total turnoff, and as a result, I’m less inclined to really dig into an album or whatever it is because, well, ugh, so chic.

Am I always right? Nope. But the thing about music is it’s not a race to be first to find a thing, and once a record’s out, it’ll still be there after the fever-pitch has come down a bit. There’s a certain freedom in being late to the party. Thus it is that I’ve recently taken on Author & Punisher‘s Beastland, which is positioned as Shone‘s sixth long-player (though I’m not sure how that count actually works). Issued in 2018 as a first offering through Relapse Records, it is a smartly-executed eight-track/36-minute collection that wastes neither its own nor your time, and Shone‘s connection to doom can be felt not so much in the audio itself — though certainly the sounds he makes are weighted, sometimes cruelly so — but in the structures and traditions he’s following. As one might expect, there’s a good deal of influence from Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails to be felt throughout — and how Reznor isn’t beating down Shone‘s door to collaborate, I don’t know — but the lumbering tempos that punctuate most of Beastland, from “Pharmacide” and the shouty single “Nihil Strength” into the noise-soaked “Ode to Bedlam” onward, certainly offer a thread. Also a threat. Further, the fullness of sound and depth of the mix, Shone‘s vocals being alternately buried and at the fore, sometimes switching in the span of a lyric, as on “Ode to Bedlam,” which is the shortest inclusion at 3:29 and soon devolves into noise and drone before building back as a transition to the more melodic centerpiece duo “The Speaker is Systematically Blown” and “Nazarene,” both of which dare to be catchy and soaring in their duly-blown-out melody, more brazenly so even than “Nihil Strength,” the very beat of which is a hook unto itself.

And like a more traditional doom record, as Beastland moves into side B, the palette expands, from the angularity and atmosphere of “Apparition” into the closing pair “Night Terror” and “Beastland” itself, the former which dons a techno siren at the outset and moves into a steady hum and roll that cycle through and pull apart in a way that feels built outward from the false restart at the end of “Nazarene,” and the latter title-track which is more purely a work of ambient noisy chaos, still set to a beat as much of it is. “Night Terror” and “Beastland” both top six minutes, with the finale echoing Blade Runner in its echoing keyboard melodies like ethereal horns sounding, even as static grit underlies and Shone‘s voice follows the notes. Beastland ends with a churn and a plod that fades into what seems to be a last grunted exhale, which runs counter to the kind of inhuman(e) aural assault that much of the record has provided but is a reminder nonetheless that there’s a person behind the operation of all these robotics and all these willfully horrifying sounds.

If you’ve ever seen Author & Punisher, you probably don’t need me to describe what it’s like, with Shone surrounded by these machines of his own making, becoming the machine himself, etc., layers on layers of multimedia metaphor. I’m not inclined to add to the din of praise that’s been heaped on dude for the last however long — though by all accounts I’ve heard, he’s a nice guy, and the very, very least one can say of his work is that it’s innovative, and that’s before you get to the quality of the songcraft, which is palpable in a manner beyond whatever novelty of the individualized aesthetic — but the influence he’s had on others is plain to hear in these songs, and as bands and groups pick up on Shone‘s ends, if not the means, and hopefully adapt that to their own styles, that only stands Author & Punisher out as all the more singular. What strikes me about listening to it rather than watching it, though, isn’t the forward nature of the aggression. That’s there, sure enough, but it’s the methodical feel of so much of what Shone brings to bear. By its nature, you can’t really call Author & Punisher raw in how it’s made — it would seem just to require too much effort, as opposed to plugging in a guitar and letting rip — but there is a drive toward the primal in some of the underlying simplicity of the beats, that when you strip away all the surrounding and sometimes overwhelming cacophony, feels markedly and purposefully primitive. Organic? Maybe.

Maybe that’s Shone himself serving as the unifying presence in what he calls his ‘control room.’ Fair enough. Shone is set to tour Europe in January with Igorrr, though of course life itself remains a shrug-and-wait-and-see kind of deal for the time being, so Author & Punisher has opted to share videos from a recent tour opening for Tool instead. As to what comes next, if it’s more dystopia, at least I know whose records to put on.

As always, I hope you enjoy. Thanks for reading.

—

The mornings have become a challenge, though perhaps not as much of one as they could be. The Pecan has been waking up around 6:30, which feels like a gift. General process is The Patient Mrs. gets the puppy — Omi; now permanent title, short for Iommi — and I get him. She takes dog out, I change a usually-poop-filled diaper. Potty training is a process. Anyway, it’s when she comes back in with the dog that he gets super-excited, then the dog gets excited, and the energy feedback loop ignites. Once he’s cleaned up, he goes where he goes, and inevitably, he’s going for the dog. But he’s still two — that’s exactly how my wife and I say it: still two; it has been a very long year — and so can’t really handle it. He gets worked up, gets worried, then inevitably swats at or kicks at Omi and, yeah, that shit just doesn’t work for me.

Yesterday and today, she stayed in the kitchen while I made him breakfast before coming to work on this post, and The Patient Mrs. and I have been switching off one and the other. It’s easier to get work done with the dog than the kid, so whoever’s working has Omi and whoever’s got The Pecan has The Pecan. That’s her right now. I’ll go in the other room in a little bit and trade off so she can work, and she’ll take the dog. It’s not so cut and dry as all that — most of the time I give him breakfast since he eats better for me; I’m not shy about shoving food in his mouth — but it’s Friday and she knows I like to end the week early, so I am grateful for the chance to bang this out.

Dog’s asleep somewhere in this room. Kid’ll get a bath in a bit — I took a break from writing during the second-to-last paragraph of the Author & Punisher writeup above (could you tell?) and we went for a run, which now that it’s pouring rain, I’m glad we did — so I’ll handle that and hopefully The Patient Mrs. doesn’t get saddled with too much what we call “puppy time” and usually seems to involve chewed shoes, feet, or furniture, or peeing on the floor.

The key to little things — dogs or people — is wearing them out. Walks for the dog, runs for the kid. Fine in the summer, though I guess we made it through this winter, and plague-permitting we’ll make it through the next. I have a bit before I need to worry about it, anyhow.

I hope you and yours are well. I’ve been struggling with having put on a bit of weight, and trying to manage that while at the same time dealing with other stresses. All anxiousness immediately goes to food/body image for me, which, if I needed further proof of disordered eating, there it is. Didn’t need that proof.

So.

My father fell on July 3 and has been in the hospital since then, in Allentown, Pennsylvania. He’s 77, I think. He was planning to move from nearby his sister in North Carolina to Allentown to be close to other friends and live in a retirement community. This was a move I advised against voraciously and was ignored. My mother, same on one of the rare occasions they spoke. Ahead of his move, he was staying with a friend and fell backwards down a flight of stairs. Portrait of an old man, falling.

Okay.

Among my family — and given the further-than-arm’s-length nature of our relationship, this feels surreal to say — I am probably the one in recent years who has been most in touch with him. We communicate semi-regularly. We have nothing much in common beyond blood and name — though the older I get… — but we keep it light, avoid politics or discussion of my mother or sister when possible, and there you go. He’s shown increasing signs of dementia over the last few years — he forgot he met my son, for example — and since his fall has been what the hospital case worker described to me as “confused.” He doesn’t know where he is, doesn’t always know what year it is or who he is.

Okay.

Though he and my mother have been separated for the last 25 years, they’ve never officially divorced. Why? I don’t know. Holdover stigma? My mother, a teacher 11 years retired, has decent state insurance and has kept him on it all this time, but because the American healthcare system is fucked — something COVID has only aggravated — Medicaid can maybe go after her assets to cover the cost of longterm care, which he’ll need since he has to relearn how to walk, and this lengthy hospital stay. This week, we all got on Zoom with a divorce attorney. I was writing the Turtle Skull news post on Wednesday when that happened; it just finally went up today. It’s been a lot.

But okay.

Court appoints a custodian once it’s proved my father is non compos mentis, which should not be a challenge, and I guess everything moves forward at a snail’s pace there. In the meantime, The Patient Mrs. and I have started mortgage proceedings to buy the house we live in from my mother, who inherited it from my grandmother, so there’s that additional layer of something-happening over the last couple weeks, which along with puppy, kid, pandemic, fascism, on and on and on and on, has meant that, among other things, I was feeling too overwhelmed to put together a Gimme Radio show this week.

It’ll be back on in two weeks.

Okay.

I’m exhausted now, so I must be finished, and in any case, it’s time for me to trade off dog for kid with The Patient Mrs., who has more than earned that title during this period. My only regret is not calling her The Brilliant Mrs., because even more than her patience with me — which is ample — it is the continued light she shines that makes my life possible. I have said this before and will continue to say it until I die: she is the center around which my universe spins.

I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Please be well most of all, and thank you for reading, whether or not you still are.

FRM.

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