Gnod- Abstehen der ohren (England 2007)
Gnod- Live Birth 16/3/07
Gnod- Abstehen der ohren (England 2007)
Gnod- Live Birth 16/3/07
From Aural Innovations #37 (Sep 2007)
Gnod is a new group from England that are really into some far out stuff… This demo CD features 6 tracks in 47 minutes. The title track is a suite of 4 tracks. The music is a mixture of repetitive grooves with samples mainly bass, drums and keyboards. The bands music is mostly improvised, dreamy, droney and sometimes far out. This material was recorded live to mindisc according to the bio on myspace. Anyway, Astehen begins to melt into outer space bliss around 5 minutes and then falls quite quiet. The 3rd part starts with the sounds of feedback, multiple rhythms on strange cans and drums or whatever as the heavy bass and feedback builds. This piece reminds me a lot of Circle from Finland. The ending piece goes back to the melodic way the piece started (may even be the same piece sampled again). Hippydrone is next and a short noisy drone piece with some far out stuff going on. Liked this one a lot. 24 minutes over Manchester ends this demo CD. This track starts slowly with some drums playing and an electronic drone slowly taken building and morphing as the drums are slowly mixed louder. Around 7 minutes the main drone fades and another begins to take over in another direction, until the piece becomes almost ambient but quite mysterious. Some piano filters into the track 14 mins or so in and the track becomes more melodic. IT ends totally spaced out.. Cool stuff.
The Live CD was performed in March 2007 and features 4 new improvisations in 37 minutes. Shaken from Safety starts and slowly builds with just drums and bass and then some synths and it sounds like violin filter into the sound as it grows and guitar. The drumming starts to get more and more intense around 12 mins or so and mood of the music goes dark but the groove intensifies and the band really flies for a bit and then spaces out… Limbilical Tension is next begins not all that well but takes form on a cool bass line that the hand drums are now hooked into the spaceyness bubbles up from underneath. This leads directly into The Epidural, a very cool piece of repetitive drone groove music built on a heavy bass line. The groove slowly dies and leads straight into the last track, The Crowning. This track really picks up the pace and gets heavy and spaced out.. Far out stuff and a great trip! This live stuff is for sure for fans of the Finnish band Circle.. come and get it.. Hope these guys get into a proper studio…
For more information you can visit the band's web site at: http://www.myspace.com/gnodgnod
Reviewed by Scott Heller