Kneel Before Religious Icons possesses a rare, dark beauty and discomforting potency that simply has to be heard to be believed.
[Release page] Dominick Fernow is probably better known to most as Prurient, whose earnest and for some, impenetrable industrial and power-electronic releases, not mention searing noise stage performances, attracts an audience with a high tolerance for the conceptual and the avant-garde, not to mention tinnitus. His own New York based Hospital Productions is no stranger to the shocking and controversial either, its imagery and marketing often bordering on the fetishistic, and those already too terrified by Prurient’s extreme noise terror may assume that his entire oeuvre will hold no interest for them.
In 2010, however, Fernow began issuing limited edition cassettes (later released digitally) under a new Vatican Shadow alias that saw him heading toward the more accessible side of industrial techno. Mining a rich vein of tense, oppressive and unnerving sonic ore that followers of like-minded labels such as the now sadly defunct Sandwell District, Blackest Ever Black or Modern Love would find far more palatable, the vibrant ambience of Pakistan Military Academy and relentless, militarized techno-thump of Kneel Before Religious Icons stood out from the crowd. It is the latter that Type recently offered up in a characteristically lush new (initially transparent green) vinyl and digital edition.
It’s fascinating how Fernow creates such expansive soundscapes from a palette of such oppressive sound-sources, every track shot through with hot, smoke-filled winds, sandy and dirt-caked textures, and an omnipresent sense of danger. You’d be hard pressed to pick a better opening track than the defining “Chopper Crash Marines’ Names Release,” with arid pads, gravel-crunched percussion and echoing eastern drum patterns describing a fevered race through occupied territory on high alert. “Harbingers Of Things To Come” ups the ante considerably, the rhythms now the pounding of chopper blades and assault rifle fire, followed by the ruthlessly pounding anti-aircraft guns of the shrapnel-pelted “Gods Representative On Earth.”
“Shooter In The Same Uniform As The Soldiers” and “Missing HMM364 Squadron Purple Foxes Assassins” are relentless, rolling convoys of crunched up, gritty industrial engine noise and clattering rhythms creating a mesmerising blur of sound that pummels the brain into a sort of oily paralysis, powerless as it washes over you. Album highlight “Church Of All Images” further smothers the Vatican Shadow template in a glaze of haze, as if we’re hearing the music having just been deafened by nearby explosions; events are indistinct and and muffled, yet still alarmingly proximate. It is only on “Worshippers At The Same Mosque” that we are given a brief respite from the furious onslaught and which, together with the more aggressive but equally atmospheric “Final Victory: Christ Christ Became A Man And Had Truly Assumed Human Nature” feature suitably reverential, muslin gauze covered pads and a sort of muted nimbus associated with places of worship and ceremony.
Those familiar with the original cassette/digital release on Hospital Recordings will notice that the vast majority of the tracks on this reissue are not only shorter than before but also edited quite differently. For an immediate point of reference, those that recall the abrupt beginnings and endings of The Caretaker’s An Endless Bliss Beyond This World will be familiar with the vertical cuts that have been made here. Apparently, Fernow was never one hundred percent happy with the original, so this new presentation both tightens up the experience and creates an even greater feeling of unease. These shock tactics are a brilliant thematic addition, but at times definitely do sound extremely odd.
What Fernow hasn’t dropped with the Vatican Shadow project is the controversial imagery and titling that accompanies each release, and the unfortunate consequence of this is that many people find the overt references to US military involvement, interference and insurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan so egregious that they either refuse to fully engage with it, or downright refuse to audition the music at all. The imagery is both more and less subtle on this Type reissue, the front cover a close up shot of lined up rifles and military footwear (that irritating “boots on the ground” cliche the media are so obsessed with currently) while the reverse is a newly zoomed in and heavily cropped section of the original’s provocative cover photo of Nidal Hassan.
Is Fenrow testing us with all of this? Is it supposed to be some sort of deliberate filter? One has to wonder whether the music would elicit the same emotional responses if these military elements were entirely absent and the music heard on its own terms, but for most it is probably too late to tell. Nevertheless, Kneel Before Religious Icons possesses a rare, dark beauty and discomforting potency that simply has to be heard to be believed.
Kneel Before Religious Icons is available on Type. [Release page]
