Churner - Florescent Bondage [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2010]
“Florescent Bondage” finds creative US noise project Churner creating some of his most conventional harmonic and at times approachable work to date. With the album offering up seven very different and inventive takes on noise with elements of distortion buried synth-pop and sound tracking elements appearing along the way. The album opens with “Tied In Knots/Princess” which starts off with doomed and discordant avant punk guitar thumbing, before it raisers briefly into reverberate guitar texturing. Then it jumps into jitter and bulldozing mixture of Power electronics, stuck helicopter blade noise and extreme roaring guitar scraping with weird electro textured voice over the top. Track two “ Graceful Abuser” is a mixture of throbbing lo-grade synth pop march and closely miked & ultra distorted vocals. Track Four “Soul Fisting” is all about sustained and repeated bass piano hits being engulfed by roaring and tearing noise in quite a dramatic manner- it feels like a low grade, slightly ham-fisted but rewarding mix of modern classical minimalism and noise.
Track Six “To Rape you” is the longest track here at just shy of the fourteen minute mark. It starts out quite spaced out, but distortion boiled keyboard harmonic patterns that are feed through a hell of a lot of feedback. By the eight minute mark he’s added in a jack-knife beat to the proceedings and the sound all piles up around you in slow wavering, ultra distorted blocks of keyboard plod and feedback smarted pre-set beats. The album exits with “Falling Asleep In Your Own Blood” which finds Churner at his most dramatic and wavering cinematic as he slowly un-weaves this deeply hurt and dusky piano/synth melody, which he wonderfully glazers in processors sustain. The track brings to mind a slowed & damaged take on Angelo Badalamenti soundtrack work for David Lynch’s more dark and sleazed take on Americana like Blue Velvet & Wild At Heart.
So “Florescent Bondage” is another very brave and creative step in noise composition from Churner, that mostly mangers to pull off what it’s trying to put across. Sure at times it’s slightly off-angle and bit too wonky for it’s own good as Churner sometime displays quite rudimentary programming and keyboard talents; but these can mostly be forgotten and forgiven as most of the time he mangers to pull off an rewarding mix of seared noise creativity and more felt/ dramatic mood making.
Roger Batty
Churner - Against the Grains [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
The spectularly prolific Krimson had a busy year in 2009, releasing in more than two dozen releases as Churner on his own Violent Noise Atrocities label. Amongst them was this 3" CD, entitled "Against the Grains". Here, Krimson delivers an appropriately 'churning' 20 minute slice of emotionally neutral harsh noise wall. His tendencies towards freewheeling harsh noise freakouts and general frantic activities are mostly suppressed, though I intuit there are bursts of restless activity just beneath the threshold
Track Six “To Rape you” is the longest track here at just shy of the fourteen minute mark. It starts out quite spaced out, but distortion boiled keyboard harmonic patterns that are feed through a hell of a lot of feedback. By the eight minute mark he’s added in a jack-knife beat to the proceedings and the sound all piles up around you in slow wavering, ultra distorted blocks of keyboard plod and feedback smarted pre-set beats. The album exits with “Falling Asleep In Your Own Blood” which finds Churner at his most dramatic and wavering cinematic as he slowly un-weaves this deeply hurt and dusky piano/synth melody, which he wonderfully glazers in processors sustain. The track brings to mind a slowed & damaged take on Angelo Badalamenti soundtrack work for David Lynch’s more dark and sleazed take on Americana like Blue Velvet & Wild At Heart.
So “Florescent Bondage” is another very brave and creative step in noise composition from Churner, that mostly mangers to pull off what it’s trying to put across. Sure at times it’s slightly off-angle and bit too wonky for it’s own good as Churner sometime displays quite rudimentary programming and keyboard talents; but these can mostly be forgotten and forgiven as most of the time he mangers to pull off an rewarding mix of seared noise creativity and more felt/ dramatic mood making.
Roger BattyChurner - Against the Grains [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
of audibility. There is a 'foreground' and a 'background'; a feeling of spacial depth and
denseness, showcasing the sophistication and intuitive intelligence of Churner's compositions. The barage is mostly constant, at first revealing only very slight changes even under close
examination, sounding quite similar to the thoughtless oblivion of Vomir. The piece slowly
stretches into an expansive echoscape, but never becomes 'ambient'. Slight tonal shifts
occur in the resonances and the track starts to resemble a howling wind around 10 minutes,
and dips significantly in harshness for a short time. Some classic sounding filter sweeps that
any Merzbow listener would recognize become obvious around 6 minutes, and at the end,
when a high pass filter turns the wall into a screeching whitewash before the machines click
off with a heavy, satisfying crackle. I've always thought the abrupt track cutoff was noise
music's greatest dramatic compositional device.
The overall texture of the wall, the most important attribute to any HNW release, is thick
and physical, achieving surprising nuance with what sounds like cheap equipment (other
Churner releases sound significantly more lo-fi). As with Vomir, no particular frequency
band is emphasized, and there is no attempt to give this particular wall a distinctive or
memorable character. In this way, it is philosophically 'pure' harsh noise wall - "entertainment"
is not the aim, only an overall assaulting, animalistic experience. For the purposes of
"Against the Grains", Churner's at times gushingly romantic intensity is distilled into simple
clarity of intent. The bottom line is that I find "Against the Grains" to be a solid entry into
the impressive discography of Churner, and a great example of the aesthetic and credo
of the HNW movement. It doesn't stand out much from the pack, but then, I doubt it's i
ntended to. This is for people who love harsh noise wall, and understand that it often comes
from the collective unconscious, rendering the distinguishing of individual artists from each
other unnecessary.
Josh Landry
Churner - Adhesive [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
'Violent Noise Atrocities' label owner, who is also the father of the young, yet prolific project "Churner", is releasing albums on a pretty fast pace. The last Churner album I got for a review for a different web magazine was 'Terminal Disorder', and today I am listening to 'Adhesive', which sounds different and shows another side to Churner's music. With the absence of track titles and other texts on this album, the name 'Adhesive' needs to be taken seriously when listening to this CDr. The five tracks have one thing in common and it is their relentless focus on dense noise. "Adhesive" seems to be the right choice for the description of these five parts of the album because there
is not one moment in which Churner allows his music to become any less than a solid
and sticky monument that swallows everything in its wake. All of the tracks have this
monotonous, insane droning that on first observation is just what it sounds like – a
monotonous noise. Churner, however, makes it twist and bend in infinite ways as it
develops, and also makes each of the track stand out on its merits. However, you
cannot ignore the fact that the tracks time length is also having influence over the
characteristics of the album, with the last track being almost 20 minutes long, while other
tracks last for either five or ten minutes. This last track offer a bigger chunk from the album,
not only in time length, but in the high energy that Churner is putting in his music, and in the
audio violence that he supports.
Adhesive is all about raw and naked noise, delivering an album that best fits both the artist
and the albums title. In the end, what is left is Churner dedication to violence to sonic violence.
Adhesive is a disturbing album that will appeal to all and any noise fans.
Oren Ben-Yosef
Churner - Static Beauty [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
Dan E, also known as Krimson, has released a large number of mostly noise oriented releases as Churner. "Static Beauty" is the best selling album on Churner's own Violent Noise Atrocity label, and it's not hard to see why. The sound is meaty, rough, physical and often improvisational as many forms of noise are... yet absolutely possessed of a sense of beauty (as indicated by the album title), drama and even melody, in several indisputable cases. grungy, black metal-esque picked clean riff slowly emerges from a suspenseful yet harmonious bed of tense electronic shimmer in opener "Statik Beauty". A lone squealing feedback voice takes the place of human vocals, spitting and snarling out sorrows.
"Three Dimensional Deceiver" is trebley, windswept fuzz, like a low fidelity mic placed on a stormy hilltop. Until Krimson's characteristic whisper-scream enters after a little less than a minute for its first appearance on the album. His sound is obviously inspired by black metal in that it sounds like a lost spirit or a ghost, gasping and hissing, but its much lower than your usual necro shriek. He conveys what I would call a violent melancholy. The poetic cadence of the lyrics make the piece mesmerizing. "I know who you are..."
"Decimator" is a tragically epic synth melody thrown into delicious overload. I usually dislike noise with cheap, fuzzy, digital sounding distortions, but it really fits what he's doing here, and nowhere else on the album does it sound like this... I can't complain. This has grown into one of my favorite tracks. It stands out from the rest of the album in that it feels either sequenced or through composed. It begins as single notes and later becomes a harmonized progression of chords. This track really showcases Krimson's flair for romanticism, and his remarkable ability to pull off gushing emotional intensity within the often completely unsentimental noise idiom, all without losing a scrap of dignity. You feel his raw passion here.
With the 4th track "Revoided", "Static Beauty" becomes another kind of album - sparsser, looser and harsher, more easily classifiable as 'harsh noise' or 'power electronics'. Each of the final 5 tracks sounds completely improvised, and consist mostly of the Krimson's heavily distorted and otherwise processed voice. Bits of drone and harsh noise are sometimes overlayed, but always mixed to the back to make room for Krimson's vocal. "Lost In You", for example, is vocals over an insistent, rich electronic hum which becomes a buzz and finally a squealing siren whine. The modulations of the underlying electronic tone wonderfully compliment the building energy of the vocals. "NEVER BE THE SAME...", Krimson howls into the wind. We got a little taste of this kind of style with "Three Dimensional Deceiver", but even for that track it sounded like the lyrics must have been written beforehand, meaning it was a more pre-meditated piece. These later tracks do not distinguish themselves as well as the first few; they are hard to tell from other or to bring to mind after the record ends, but they are cathartic, visceral experiences that compliment the other aspects of Churner's sound well.
In "Dissolved" we find Krimson again using his voice as a creator of harsh noise. Rather than relying on feedback and extraneous sounds of the microphone, most of the noise appears to be produced using his actual voice, showing his power as a performer. There appear to be few layers, yet this is an impressively enveloping, huge sound. It's my favorite of the second half of the record.
The closer "Outside the Window" is the album's densest, most overloaded piece and creates some nice crunchy HNW-esque sounds. Though the track does have vocals, the mix is so dense I can't really make anything out and I think it feels like HNW. I'm glad he chose to end on this note.
"Static Beauty" is a balanced, listenable piece of work with enough catchy moments to stick in your mind but never to compromise its integrity. Both the melodic, emotional passages and full on harsh noise improvs are executed with confidence and prove quite satisfying. The pieces themselves are only loosely structured, but I would guess a significant amount of thought was put into the track ordering, and this is truly an album where each element and style included is used with taste. You couldn't ask for a more accessible noise record, and this would be a great album to introduce someone to the genre with.
Josh Landry
Vice Wears Black Hose - Part 2 [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
examination, sounding quite similar to the thoughtless oblivion of Vomir. The piece slowly
stretches into an expansive echoscape, but never becomes 'ambient'. Slight tonal shifts
occur in the resonances and the track starts to resemble a howling wind around 10 minutes,
and dips significantly in harshness for a short time. Some classic sounding filter sweeps that
any Merzbow listener would recognize become obvious around 6 minutes, and at the end,
when a high pass filter turns the wall into a screeching whitewash before the machines click
off with a heavy, satisfying crackle. I've always thought the abrupt track cutoff was noise
music's greatest dramatic compositional device.
The overall texture of the wall, the most important attribute to any HNW release, is thick
and physical, achieving surprising nuance with what sounds like cheap equipment (other
Churner releases sound significantly more lo-fi). As with Vomir, no particular frequency
band is emphasized, and there is no attempt to give this particular wall a distinctive or
memorable character. In this way, it is philosophically 'pure' harsh noise wall - "entertainment"
is not the aim, only an overall assaulting, animalistic experience. For the purposes of
"Against the Grains", Churner's at times gushingly romantic intensity is distilled into simple
clarity of intent. The bottom line is that I find "Against the Grains" to be a solid entry into
the impressive discography of Churner, and a great example of the aesthetic and credo
of the HNW movement. It doesn't stand out much from the pack, but then, I doubt it's i
ntended to. This is for people who love harsh noise wall, and understand that it often comes
from the collective unconscious, rendering the distinguishing of individual artists from each
other unnecessary.
Josh LandryChurner - Adhesive [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
is not one moment in which Churner allows his music to become any less than a solid
and sticky monument that swallows everything in its wake. All of the tracks have this
monotonous, insane droning that on first observation is just what it sounds like – a
monotonous noise. Churner, however, makes it twist and bend in infinite ways as it
develops, and also makes each of the track stand out on its merits. However, you
cannot ignore the fact that the tracks time length is also having influence over the
characteristics of the album, with the last track being almost 20 minutes long, while other
tracks last for either five or ten minutes. This last track offer a bigger chunk from the album,
not only in time length, but in the high energy that Churner is putting in his music, and in the
audio violence that he supports.
Adhesive is all about raw and naked noise, delivering an album that best fits both the artist
and the albums title. In the end, what is left is Churner dedication to violence to sonic violence.
Adhesive is a disturbing album that will appeal to all and any noise fans.
Oren Ben-YosefChurner - Static Beauty [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
"Three Dimensional Deceiver" is trebley, windswept fuzz, like a low fidelity mic placed on a stormy hilltop. Until Krimson's characteristic whisper-scream enters after a little less than a minute for its first appearance on the album. His sound is obviously inspired by black metal in that it sounds like a lost spirit or a ghost, gasping and hissing, but its much lower than your usual necro shriek. He conveys what I would call a violent melancholy. The poetic cadence of the lyrics make the piece mesmerizing. "I know who you are..."
"Decimator" is a tragically epic synth melody thrown into delicious overload. I usually dislike noise with cheap, fuzzy, digital sounding distortions, but it really fits what he's doing here, and nowhere else on the album does it sound like this... I can't complain. This has grown into one of my favorite tracks. It stands out from the rest of the album in that it feels either sequenced or through composed. It begins as single notes and later becomes a harmonized progression of chords. This track really showcases Krimson's flair for romanticism, and his remarkable ability to pull off gushing emotional intensity within the often completely unsentimental noise idiom, all without losing a scrap of dignity. You feel his raw passion here.
With the 4th track "Revoided", "Static Beauty" becomes another kind of album - sparsser, looser and harsher, more easily classifiable as 'harsh noise' or 'power electronics'. Each of the final 5 tracks sounds completely improvised, and consist mostly of the Krimson's heavily distorted and otherwise processed voice. Bits of drone and harsh noise are sometimes overlayed, but always mixed to the back to make room for Krimson's vocal. "Lost In You", for example, is vocals over an insistent, rich electronic hum which becomes a buzz and finally a squealing siren whine. The modulations of the underlying electronic tone wonderfully compliment the building energy of the vocals. "NEVER BE THE SAME...", Krimson howls into the wind. We got a little taste of this kind of style with "Three Dimensional Deceiver", but even for that track it sounded like the lyrics must have been written beforehand, meaning it was a more pre-meditated piece. These later tracks do not distinguish themselves as well as the first few; they are hard to tell from other or to bring to mind after the record ends, but they are cathartic, visceral experiences that compliment the other aspects of Churner's sound well.
In "Dissolved" we find Krimson again using his voice as a creator of harsh noise. Rather than relying on feedback and extraneous sounds of the microphone, most of the noise appears to be produced using his actual voice, showing his power as a performer. There appear to be few layers, yet this is an impressively enveloping, huge sound. It's my favorite of the second half of the record.
The closer "Outside the Window" is the album's densest, most overloaded piece and creates some nice crunchy HNW-esque sounds. Though the track does have vocals, the mix is so dense I can't really make anything out and I think it feels like HNW. I'm glad he chose to end on this note.
"Static Beauty" is a balanced, listenable piece of work with enough catchy moments to stick in your mind but never to compromise its integrity. Both the melodic, emotional passages and full on harsh noise improvs are executed with confidence and prove quite satisfying. The pieces themselves are only loosely structured, but I would guess a significant amount of thought was put into the track ordering, and this is truly an album where each element and style included is used with taste. You couldn't ask for a more accessible noise record, and this would be a great album to introduce someone to the genre with.
Josh LandryVice Wears Black Hose - Part 2 [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
Vice Wears Black Hose is harsh noise/wall noise project that brings together two respected US noise mongers in the form of Sam McKinlay of The Rita and Richard Ramirez of Werewolf Jerusalem & Black Leather Jesus. This cd takes in one long 40 minute track of unforgiving harsh static texturing and suffocation. The track falls in a hardcore noise fashion between all out wall noise and tense roaring harsh noise storm-that slowly shifts through different deep grains of noise textures. The pair build up an impressive and all engulf wall of roaring sound that goes from sounding like been under a endlessly pouring loud static water fall, to been trapped in side a decaying tin shack as hard hail and rain storm beats down on you at an unforgiving rate. The pair keep with-in deeper roaring and at times almost subterranean noise tones through-out the piece, as well as managing to keep the sound tinged with a nice sleazy and airless atmosphere. The track starts off relatively quiet with a low roar that tempts the listener to turn up the sound louder, but pretty soon it kicks in like a primal force rolling over your head like a stream roller; with the pair keeping the track rolling in a dense and unforgiving fashion for the whole of it's running time with only slight shifts in the texture of the noise.
Clearly not for those looking for subtle, rhythmic or harmonic traces with-in their noise matter as this is brutal, suffocating and unforgiving noise of the highest order. And through it�s extremely hash it�s somehow also rather hypnotic and strangely compelling in its roaring and ear frying weight and depth.
Roger Batty
Churner - Xxuum'r [Voilent Noise Atrocities - 2008]
Xxuum'r Part 1 is the shortest track here at just off the ten minute mark & it finds Churner creating this wonderful brooding, jerking & at times quite violent landscape of caustic drones , searing feed-back hovers & guitar pick up hack and abuse. The track swings & see-saws between the different elements in a very rewarding manner; with Churner as always balancing wonderful between atmosphere & brutality. Xxuum'r Part 2 starts off with a long swirling feed-back whine & arch of sound that really drills into your head with it’s high pitch-ness. From this opening the track quite actively switchers between: battering blunt static rumbles & drones back to searing & teeth-gritting highs again in a very fulfilling yet at times painful manner, with the track just coming just short of the 15 minute mark. Xxuum'r Part 3 seems a little denser & thick then parts one & two with this mesh of blunt drone static, feedback circes & hacking low down guitar pick-up abuse that churner bends, moulds & snakes together in a most rewarding manner. With at times the track having some almost searing harmonic traits raising ever so often to the surface. The track once more comes in around the 15 minute mark and is nice thicker end chapter to a thoroughly rewarding release.
Yet another great release from Churner who really has the ability to make very enjoyable, rewarding & varied noise matter - Xxuum'r is yet more proof that Churner is one the main rising stars of the noise underground.
Roger Batty------------------------
Toby Dammit - Satanik [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
A few of the high points from both sides of the tape come in the form of: The first track on side one which starts off fairly subdued with this soured & wonky music box twinkly & winds, which rather brought to mind creepy childhood influence giallo soundtracks. Then fairly a crowd of crudely sampled & violently placed pig grunts are added into the mix and pretty soon after that Toby pipes up with muffled rants over feedback whistle & grim rumbles- a nice sleazy atmospheric opener really. The second fairly lengthy track on side one which mixers violent scratching & wreaking of a record deck and vinyl with noise roar, feedback purrs & buzzers in a highly brutal yet efective manner.With the track having quite an unhinged/ derange child like feel to it which alot of Dammit's best work has
Side two’s first track which is roaring & groan power electronics rant over a caustically groaning backdrop of moans, car horns type pitchers, and soured, angered & grim drones- with at times an almost damaged smoky noir air drifting in & out of the sonic violence. Track four on side two which is an urgent mix of bass roar, looped soured harmonic speed-up tinkling tones & stabbing rants- again it feels almost like fuzzed & noised-up take on a giallo like soundtrack at times; with some rather nice slowed feedback smarts appearing towards the tracks end.
Satanik finds Dammit offer up a fittingly damaged tribute to horror comics he clearly loves with this mixture of wonky & sleazed power electronics, crudely & abused giallo like atmospherics & general deranged/ yet often inventive noise making.
Roger Batty----------------------------
Churner - Throat Demon [Violent Noise Atrocites - 2009]
The track opens up with this sort of manic leapfrogging overloading didgeridoo like tone which keeps jumping on top of it’s self again & again in quite a caustic & rewarding manner. By the 3 minute mark this original didgeridoo element is been violently torn & pulled apart ,& then the track drops headfirst in swirling currents of white-hot static & the track just get progressive more noisy, searing & tortures. Through out the tracks life it nicely switches & rips through boiled static expanses that under sunk by eerier harmonic tones, onto bombastically brutally noise beatings swimming & biting with jerking and sharper pitchers of sound, through to almost wall noise like static textural over pours shifting with far-off structure movement & harmonic traces patterns.
With 'Throat Demon' Churner shows he can be up there with the best for ear pummelling noise overload, yet he still keeps in place his atmosphric tendencies & shifting creative noise craft without lessening the tracks power & brutality
Roger Batty------------------------
Churner - Terminal Disorder [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
The piece in total lasts just short of an hour & is purely built from guitar, microphones, a Carvin 4X 12 Cabinet and Churner’s violent yet creative mind. Though-out Terminal Disorder's running time theres a fair bit of variation both textural and sonically yet it still keeps its pressing noisy, malevolent, violent air that’s touched by grim and bleak harmonic undertones. It goes from caustic and boiling ear crawlings, down to barren and washed-out feedback hazes that barely hold shape, onto droning blacked feedback engulfed grim harmonic throbs & walls of powerful grim sound & tone, onto piercing distorted and gone wrong music box harmonics that threaten to make your ears bleed.
On the whole Terminal Disorder mangers to keep your interest & has a good feeling of bleak progression through-out, though there are few moments towards the middle were it seems to lose focus & shape, but it soon picks back up and pulls you into its violent yet darkly curdled grim harmonic folds once more. This is my second taster of Churner’s work & I must say I’m once more very impressed as this shows the projects great ability to mix noise and atmospherics in an original and distinctive manner.
------------------------
Nastily Creative [2010-03-26]
Churner is one of the most creative, innovative & rewarding Harsh noise acts in existence today . The project is centred around USA based Dan E who also runs the excellent noise label Violent Noise Atrocities. Dan kindly agreed to give me an interview via email.m[m]Tell us a bit about how & why Churner came about? And were did the name come from?
Dan I had been working on an ambient project since 2004 called Dravorium, and I was actually pushing into noise territory with some of the stuff I was doing. My buddy Thomas (Destructive Industries) had been trying
to get me into noise for a few years, but I didn't really care for it.October 2007...he sends me a text message saying Grunt (Miko Aspa) is going to be doing a show in Boston that weekend, i am a giant fan of his blackmetal work, so I immediately said "let's go". That weekend changed my life 100%...noise and power electronics made perfect sense
to me now. Also a shopping spree at Hospital Productions helped as well. As for the name...I have to give credit to Thomas for that...I liked it and it stuck.
m[m]With all your Churner work you always seem very keen to stretch & explore noise genre, often adding in touches and elements not strictly noise bound i.e. black metal & general guitar drone textures, rough turntablism, more atmospheric & cinematic moments etc.. Are you always actively wanting to push the genre's envelope or does it happen more naturally & unintentionally?
Dan Well...I have been a drummer for 30 years...so without trying, I tend to structure what I do a lot of the time, and I honestly have no clue what I am going to record until I start. The mood I am in determines what I end up using for the session...and I basically create what I want to hear. I normally go for getting as heavy and violent of a
sound as I can most of the time. Sometimes it goes straight to disc....sometimes I may layer 4-6 30 minute sessions on top of each other before going to disc.
m[m]on the same subject as above question- is there anything you'd liketo try genre or mood wise next?
Dan Oh I am always scheming up something different...noise-wise I don't
think I have scratched the surface much with some of the stuff I would like to do. I really don't care to do something that will be just like everyone else...I know I am not doing anything innovative...but I try to create something in my own style and hopefully not sound to much like someone else. Anything is fair game as far as being an "instrument" is concerned; spikes and chalkboards are a big favourite
at the moment.
m[m]You talk about using new items to make noise with, but what's been the most problematic item you've tried to make noise with? Dan Styrofoam, it sounded great rubbing it together, but to get the friction I needed to get the sound I wanted required me using a lot of pressure....which caused it to pretty much fall apart...also finding a cheap chalkboard that the surface will not come off so quick
m[m]Talking about your drumming- how did you first get interested in this & what type of bands have you played drums in & do you still play drums now in bands?
Dan My father was a drummer when he was younger, so that is what I wanted to do from a young age...guess I was really doing noise when I was a kid if you were to ask him about all the beating and banging I did on furniture and boxes. I started playing in cover bands at age 16...mostly with people who were more interested in getting drunk and
laid instead of making music. Octagon was, and still is the onlyserious metal band I have ever been a part of. I did do a long distance recording stint with an Indiana bm band called Moon Ar, which was great, but it was tough because of my work schedule at the time.
As for now...I am still officially a member of Octagon, although I am not currently working with Mortigan on anything, he has a local drummer where he lives, eventually we will be drawn back together for another album...just waiting for the stars to align again. I also do drums in a few projects of my own...Horde of Midnight and Xykhu...which I am going to be working on more this year...just have
not had the time to get much finished. I do guitars, bass, vocals and drums in both.
M[m]what’s your recording set-up usually & how often do you record work? & do you release every thing you record?
Dan My recording set-up varies from day to day, that is why I have startedputting some credits on my releases so it may give the listener an idea of what was used. I record just about daily, and no, I have not released everything I have recorded. I have about 200 hours of unreleased stuff, some gets ran back through the processors again and
made heavier, some gets trashed. If the material doesn't feel like "Churner", I may make it into its own project if it does not fit what I think should be a Churner release. Ironically enough you gave one of my side-projects a perfect rating...truth be known I almost trashed it
because it didn't grab me on first listen after recording it. I gave it a month and came back to it, liked it, but it didn't feel like Churner...Bodies Floating In the Bay was born, which started as a Churner album title originally.
M[m] Unlike a lot of Noise projects you don't seemed to have collaborated with others much? Is this something you'd be interested in doing in the future & if so who would you like to work with?
Dan I honestly think there are too many collaborations...I am all for doing new projects with people...I have one with Boar and Doldis called The Catastrophic Trio. I also have one with Thomas from RU-486 called S.O.C.C. , but I have never been ask to do a collaboration honestly. As far as who I would like to collaborate with? Richard Ramirez, Austin (Concrete Violin), Pain Jerk, Lasse Marhaug, I know that is some dreaming, but since you ask.
m[m]Tell us a bit about how/why the Violent Noise Atrocities came about? And what are your top five favorite releases on the label thus far & why?
Dan VNA began as Dark Winter Moon Recordings back in 2005, I started it mainly to release my own material...but after getting so deep into noise, I felt I needed a more extreme sounding name for a noise label, thus VNA came to life. I still focus on my own releases, but do
releases for other people that I am friends with and if I like what they do. As for my favorite releases...a lot of my own stuff, S.T.U.G. 218, Toby Dammit, Alo Girl and Vice Wears Black Hose. As for why I like them the best, that is hard to really say, all I can tell you is that on first listen I was hooked, I only give my own material a second chance.
m[m] what’s been your fastest selling or biggest selling item on Violent Noise Atrocities?
Dan Churner's "Static Beauty"....Vice Wears Black Hose "Part Two"....Churner's "Throat Demon", in that order. I intend on keeping most of my own releases in print as long as someone is wanting to buy them.
m[m]Do you ever perform live as Churner and if so can you explain the live set-up and what people can expect? If not is it something you'd like to do in the future?
Dan I have done some live performances, but not as much as I would like to do. As for set-up, I try to go simple as possible, less chance for technical issues. As for what to expect?...well...you never know what to expect.
m[m] what’s been the most challenging /time consuming work you've done so far under the Churner name?
Dan Florescent Bondage, the idea's started coming together in April of 2009....did not officially finish it until October 2009...There are 7 tracks on the album...I actually did about 60...a lot of them were junk and were erased. I don’t know why, but I just felt this album had to be different, which is why all the effort to pick out what I thought were the best tracks. I actually "wrote" and "rehearsed" a few...unlike my normal way of doing things. Amazing to me is the track titled "To Rape You"...it is by far my favorite track I have ever done, and it may sound cheesy, but the recording was magical to me...I honestly "zoned out" half way through it and do not even recall all the synth and piano stuff that you hear...it went straight to disc...so I could not bring up the piano in the mix...but I was playing a lead...which is amazing to me considering I am not a piano player.
m[m]Any plans to release any other long form pieces like Bodies Floating In the Bay project?
Dan There are already three more albums done....two are long form like the first album....one is a bunch of shorter tracks. I have not decided when or if these will be released....one of them for certain...not sure about the other two.
m[m]Name ten records(not only noise) that have had the most effect on you and why?
Dan Kreator - Terrible Certainty
Rush - Moving Pictures
Iron Maiden - Live After Death
Slayer - Reign In Blood
Emperor - IX Equilibrium
Prurient - And Still, Wanting
SunnO))) - Black One
Merzbow - Pulse Demon
Celtic Frost - Into The Pandemonium
Grunt - Installation of Blood and Steel
Dan Each has the own unique reason for being favorites, mostly for inspiring me with playing drums and the noise albums are some favorites that I listen to for motivational purposes....either for recording or when I need something to wake me up in the morning.
m[m]You mention quite a few metal albums in your best of list- do you still buy new metal now & if so what kind of stuff do you pick-up? And can you ever see your self doing a metal meets noise project?
Dan Metal is still a major part of what I listen to and yes..I still buy a lot...recent favorites are Overkill's "Ironbound"...Funeral Mist's "Maranatha"...Grinning Deaths Head's "No Afterlife" and Gama Bomb's "Tales From the Grave". Black metal and Thrash are still regulars in
my rotation...although I don’t care for much of either ones newer band these days. Most of the black metal I am into these days is raw and underground stuff; too much of it is too cheesy for me to get into. As for a metal/noise project...I have one I have been toying with for a few years...nothing has been released yet.
m[m]In your option do you think that noise & metal have ever been successful crossbreed? And if so what act or album do you thing managers this?
Dan I cannot honestly give you a good answer on that one. WOLD is one band that comes to mind....but I would say they are mainly noise over being black metal.
m[m]How do you it differs writing metal music & noise?
Dan With me they are very similar...I get an idea...hit record and go with it. The only stuff I truly "rehearse" is power electronics stuff that I do sometimes....I may practice a keyboard part a little while so that I make sure I don’t screw it up when I am recording....but most of what I do is just on the spot what you hear is how it happened kind of stuff.
m[m]What's out next for Churner & Violent Noise Atrocities?
Dan Lots of tape releases and more effort to promote Churner and VNA. A lot of Churner releases have gotten great reviews, but that has not seemed to get me or the label much notice, so I am going to focus more on promotion this year. All profits go back into the label, so it
would be great to do some pro-tape releases and maybe another pro-cd release as well.
Thanks to Dan for his time & effort with interview & for supplying the pictures for the interview.
www.churnernoise.blogspot.com
www.vnarecordings.blogspot.com
Roger Batty ------
Churner - Vulturistic [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
At around about the ten minute mark deep & pained vocal roars start been heard in the thick textured map of sounds and things just get dense more fierce & noisy from here on in as Churner just builds & builds the layers of screaming, tearing & roaring sound matter; with the vocals attack at times almost taking on a demonic robot type screams & bays. As with all great long form noise tracks it’s kept active, shifting yet very unforgiving, through it all you still get odd hints of the bleak & barren Sci-fi edge brewing to the surface.
Another very rewarding & ear damaging work from Churner who once more shows he’s trying new things sonically with each new release. This would work as an ideal sonic companion while reading a very violent, deranged & paranoid soaked sci-fi novel.
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Churner - Sandstorming [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
Onto track two and Churner drops straight in with a very harsh, fast wind ripping & tearing wall of sound built around several layers of noise ‘walls’. It sounds like being outside in a force ten gale & trying to keep on your feet on the ground as bits of trees, debris & people move past you, fast. As the track goes on it becomes more rumbling, deep & ripping in the mixing of noise layers. All told more violent & unforgiving then the first track, but it's avery well executed & put together slice of noise making.
On the whole ‘Sandstorming’ offers up two very shifting & active walls of noise making; but I have to say at times I wish he’d dwelled a bit longer in places as there are some great wall textures here that seem to speed by way too fast. But if you enjoy highly lively & shifting wall making or want to hear Churner's own one off take on the genre this is well worth your time.
Roger Batty-------------------------
Churner - Bone Yard [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2010]
Lastly we have ‘Night vulture’ which comes in just under the seventeen minute mark & finds Churner utilizing to start with mournful & blacked electric guitar textures, close miked doomed & torturess sawing textures. Then later dips into more gloomy ‘n’ creepy guitar moans, similar baying and creepy moans like the first track and black storm bashed feedback billows. It’s an ‘ok’ track, but it just sounds a little too like the first track, but with added on guitar moans, drones & hacks on top. I really like some of the more creepy & horror atmosphere lined guitar textures here, but I just wish Churner had done more with the tracks background layers instead of just rehashing a similar sonic path to the first track
So all told another worthwhile release from Churner showing him brewing up an nice nightmarish & horror bound feel. I just wished he’d developed the guitar textures more on the second track as you leave the album feeling a little underwhelmed.
Roger Batty------------------------
Bodies Floating In the Bay - The Glimmer Of Darkness [Violent Atrocities - 2009]
Bodies Floating In the Bay may sound like the name of another straight-up Gallio influence slice of HNW, and through there are elements of walled noise here this is a much more complex & detailed beast that’s difficult to put into one noise bracket or genre.
Roger Batty
The man behind the project is Churner and with 'The Glimmer Of Darkness' he builds a damned and twisted sonic travelogue with the use of: Carvin Sx-300, Contact Microphone & a broken turntable. The 29 minute track has elements of: violent manipulated pop music, caustic yet creative turntable abuse, static tone loops, sudden boils of HNW, echoed & sinister noise tone dwell, & a sludgy feeling of pain & death. For me the track really feels like your follow the killing, mutilation & the ultimate dumping of a body in large water mass and then its slow bobbing journey along the water. As Churner creates a very rich, but dammed sonic tapestry of muffled and mutilated pop/ soul music, as if heard from a distant as the body bobs along or as the killer rips pulls & stabs the last drops of live out of the victim. There's all manner of sawing & hacking- to illustrate the killers working on the body, and the HNW burst when the killer rage suddenly explodes or the body hits a rock or other obstacle on it’s river bound journey, making more damage to it’s wreacked & ruined shell.
From beginning to end this is a splendid & highly crafted slice of well thought out & executed noise compositions; which shows Churner as one of the most interesting, creative & consistent noise artists operating in the USA today. To find out more pop along to either Churners myspace or Violent Atrocities myspace
Roger Batty--------------------
Churner - Spirit Defector [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]The albums made-up of four lengthy works of sonic draining fear and pain that total in all just over an hour in running time. Opening up the disk we have the mammoth and shifting bleak delights of the wonderfully entitled The Creeping Chill and it’s near on half an-hour unfold. The track is built around slowly shifting thick, musty and hope clogging electro textures and noise matter; with one dense and muffled drone noise drift slowly crashing, or simmering then boiling into the next. There’s a nice selection of different pitchers and tones going on here from high to throbbing deep, down to gut rumbling level, up to feedback smarts- with the track having a wonderfully hypnotic yet ugly feel to it. Track two Grave Full of Memories starts out with a great oppressive dungeon like feel that erupts into sadistic sound torture; as if you’re going deeper and deeper into the dungeon depths- coming across more ripped torn and blooded captives. It starts off with moans and groans, dread filled silence then suddenly explodes into hammering, rip ‘n’ tear tone attacks, rabid microphone abuse storms. And like the first track it ones attention is nicely kept by the shifting tone violence of the piece. And lastly keeping with the torture/dungeon theme feel we have the track Dark Room Torture, which is built around slow monition muffled basher/hits and guttural strikes that either end with after trails of grim shadowy brood or searing sonic violence.
With Spirit Defector Churner build some very sadistic, brutal and grim sounding sonic stretchers and torturess dwells; which are cleverly detailed and shifting. With the album often managing to very effectively bridge the difficult gap between brutality and atmosphere pefectly.
Roger Batty---------------
Artist: Churner 
Title: Terminal Disorder
Label: Violent Noise Atrocities
....Noise
Tracklist:01 Untitled
Churner's introduction on the back of the album shapes itself in a rather ambivalent fashion. When you let someone listen to your music, and you remind him that you have been a musician for 6 months only, the same thing that is written on this album, you are doing one of two things. Either you are apologizing for what we are about to hear, making us keep in mind that this is rather an amateur stuff, or you know this music is great and so you are oging on extra credit, keeping in mind that you were not professional at all while recording this. Churner's text does not portray itself as arrogant in any way, so it automatically falls into the other category, and rather needlessly.
Almost one hour of feedbacks and guitars might sound monotonic at best and boring at worse, but this is not the case with "Terminal Disorder". Churner is making the crunchy, distorted feedback crystallize itself in many different manners throughout the album, at times the distortion is so severe that it sounds like a malfunction, yet at others Churner manages to reach to some beautiful highlights and monumental soundscapes. Assuming that htis is indeed a one take recording, this one hour long live track functions like a harsh and bumpy trip, with its creator shifting between holding your hand through it, to pushing you forward to slamming you on the wall and blasting your brain with broken sounds and pain therapy.
An almost oriental guitar playing is breaking the feedback dreadnought for few minutes and deliver a very nice musical twist to the album's progression, quickly changing again to the heavy strumming and bombastic feedback. "Terminal disorder" is in no way monotonic, as Churner knows well when to loose the pressure on the ear and when to tighten it, and while this album may suffer a little from sound quality here and there, it has the power, the dynamics and the fact that it is an interesting and moving album. Churner growls with electronic distortion and later on it turns into a high pitch shriek that manages to make me feel really uncomfortable. The pace changes by the last part of the album and it seems like Churner is dragging it up a little before bidding us farewell. I wonder if the album would have sound better if it was a little shorter, as it is hard to stay attentive to an hour long noise track and be able to listen to it carefully. However, even if making the album shorter might have helped Churner, releasing it as long as it is does not harm it in any way, because even though it has the massive pressure on the ears, Churner knows how to keep it interesting.
When it is over, I swear I could hear some influences and patterns of other groups I know, but Churner still stays with a solid and bombastic album no matter what.
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Heathen Harvest (www.heathenharvest.com)
August 15, 2008
Artist: Churner
Title: Sound Seizures
Label: Dark Winter Moon Recordings
Genre: Harsh Noise
01 Brown Bag of Despair
02 Ear Seizure
03 Dramamine Blues
Churner was an unknown project to me and having in mind that the CD-R has quite a generic cover, I wasn..t really sure about what to expect on this one. First seconds of the record define the intensity of these three tracks, a strong dose of harsh noise purity with a particular use of feedback and an overall mass of brutality.
First track starts in a rough and dense way, precipitating collisions and brain ablation. No confession can lighten the pain, there is nothing to see here. Since the begining it leaves no hope or surprises, marking the general tone from this point on. Heavy infections and death in a bag, despair as a scream as well as a trail of cancerous words, erratic and explosive. Subterranean but still clashing and piercing, as subtle as the march of disease.
"Ear Seizure" focus less on internal textures and more on disconfort, abrasive feedback eruption, preparing the newborn rape and all permanent physical sequels. Fisting dead gods, slashing and cruising on blood and piss and hiss. Only deaf is real.
"Dramamine Blues" is an enormous insistence on those same ideas of autophagy and intoxicated brain mortification, medicated giants of stone, invoking storms and sonolence. Self inflicted dementia and psychedelic indigestion antecipate the expulsions.
Circular invasions of tunnels and near death memories, dissipating towards the crushing implosion of anonyomous skies. Yet the watchers guard nothing, no more. Desintegration will always be an arrival point, an exercise in dedication and perserverance.
-----------------01 Brown Bag of Despair
02 Ear Seizure
03 Dramamine Blues
Churner was an unknown project to me and having in mind that the CD-R has quite a generic cover, I wasn..t really sure about what to expect on this one. First seconds of the record define the intensity of these three tracks, a strong dose of harsh noise purity with a particular use of feedback and an overall mass of brutality.
First track starts in a rough and dense way, precipitating collisions and brain ablation. No confession can lighten the pain, there is nothing to see here. Since the begining it leaves no hope or surprises, marking the general tone from this point on. Heavy infections and death in a bag, despair as a scream as well as a trail of cancerous words, erratic and explosive. Subterranean but still clashing and piercing, as subtle as the march of disease.
"Ear Seizure" focus less on internal textures and more on disconfort, abrasive feedback eruption, preparing the newborn rape and all permanent physical sequels. Fisting dead gods, slashing and cruising on blood and piss and hiss. Only deaf is real.
"Dramamine Blues" is an enormous insistence on those same ideas of autophagy and intoxicated brain mortification, medicated giants of stone, invoking storms and sonolence. Self inflicted dementia and psychedelic indigestion antecipate the expulsions.
Circular invasions of tunnels and near death memories, dissipating towards the crushing implosion of anonyomous skies. Yet the watchers guard nothing, no more. Desintegration will always be an arrival point, an exercise in dedication and perserverance.
Artist: Churner
Title: Sewage Lagoon
Label: Dark Winter Moon Recordings
Genre: Harsh Noise / Power Electronics
Tracklist:
01 Sess Pool
02 Sewer Rat
03 Slug
With a name like Churner, this was hardly likely to be anything but searing nuclear noise really. And no surprise then to find that this 3" CD is indeed three tracks' worth of blistering skinpeel, totaling just over 23 minutes or so. Also no particular surprise are the filth-infatuated song titles, a trustworthy and steady source of inspiration for this end of the genre spectrum. And I often wonder, listening to such efforts, just how much more can be done with this style of music.
One could argue that, just like dark ambient, it's now more a matter of how the ingredients are put together rather than the originality of the compositions that counts the most. If we take that as a benchmark then I suppose this fulfills all the criteria necessary to project it high into the noisesphere, This certainly applies to the first two tracks, "Sess Pool" and "Sewer Rat", although I have to remark that the opening couple of seconds of syncopated funky drum beats had me fooled, enough anyway to make me do a double-take. The world was restored to rights very soon however, as flailing, squealing feedback, crunchy furnace blast and the sound of Armageddon swung in to mercilessly swamp that feeble intro into oblivion.
A similar aesthetic appends to "Sewer Rat", although I am not entirely sure that such a creature would quite appreciate the sentiment expressed, with its plague-ridden apocalyptic opening few minutes threatening to lay everything to waste. Mind you, I guess that that the post-apocalyptic scenario would be a sewer rat's natural constituency, allowing it to spread disease and pestilence to an already-weakened humanity. It's a gritty, dirty, filthy, and unclean noise, backed by a searing rocket-engine ferocity that sees it colonise as much of what's left as is possible. We are left in no doubt as to the only outcome possible to this scenario – putrid obliteration and rancid pus-filled decay. Whichever way you try to airbrush it, it ain't going to be nice.
So far, so predictably standard. "Slug", the final track and the album's longest at just over twelve minutes, aims to turn assumptions around with a much more experimental and sparser approach. This one is truly menacing, the granularity being almost restrained and restricted to timed explosions punctuating 'quieter' stretches of rumbling noise. Couple that with a distorted vocal howl that sounds like a mightily pissed-off Godzilla butting in now and again while once more stomping on a nigh-on uninsurable Tokyo, and that delicious frisson of heavyweight horror is complete. Eschewing the usual relentless juggernaut of unstoppable noise makes Churner a much more palatable and interesting proposition than most similar outfits, and if only for just this one track, they are to be commended.
Like any reviewer faced with the prospect of listening to yet another sonic hydrogen bomb in order to enlighten the masses, I was ready to be disappointed but also hoping for a surprise. Okay, so I was disappointed, but only as far as the first two tracks were concerned. That third piece, however, was the hoped for surprise, and redeemed everything for me, showing that the limits of what can be done with noise and harsh electronics are in some ways still to be tested and breached. It also shows that aggression need not be delineated through pure blasting sheets of undifferentiated noise. Brooding malevolence is often more effectively portrayed through slowing things right down while simultaneously plunging into the lower aural registers. This is exactly what Churner do and quite effectively so too.
So, this 3" CDr is, on the whole, nothing particularly earthshattering in terms of pushing the envelope, as the saying goes. Neither would I go so far as to say that it's without merit. It ticks all the right boxes for the most part, but it's also adventurous and playful enough to mess around with genre expectations just to see what can be done with a little thought and invention. The result in that respect is more than pleasing and should satisfy those with a penchant for broader musical interpretations while still appealing to those diehard noiseheads. Not one for easy dismissal....
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Churner - Adhesive [Violent Noise Atrocities - 2009]
Adhesive is all about raw and naked noise, delivering an album that best fits both the artist and the albums title. In the end, what is left is Churner dedication to violence to sonic violence. Adhesive is a disturbing album that will appeal to all and any noise fans.
Oren Ben-Yosef
