Ting, ting, ting, dum, dum, dum, plod plod, plod, growl, growl, growl, thump, thump, thump, judder, judder, judder, gibber, gibber, gibber and repeat for 45 minutes and there ladies and gentlemen you have it, welcome to Legion Of Andromeda.
I suppose you want a bit more though even if that does tell you pretty much all you really need to know. Well this is the debut album from this half Italian half Japanese project from M who makes the errr musical noises and seismic shapes that sound like Godzilla taking a large shit and R the howls of said beast on realising there is no toilet paper left and he has no choice but to clean his messy sphincter with the side of a very jagged sharp skyscraper.
I guess the biog blurb with mentions of Big Black, Von, Khanate, Ildjarn and Pan Sonic amongst others should have hinted at the mangled industrial wreckage and primitive noise this was going to have central to it. Scrub “central”, that in fact is all it has to it. Amidst track titles such as Transuranic Ejaculation and Sociopathic Infestation the song literally remains the same throughout. The only difference as we move from one lumbering track to the next is a slight difference in pace from slow monotonous tedium to even slower monotonous tedium.
Vocals are interesting, you can sense some semblance of actual speech beneath them as they throatily gibber and growl amidst the churning musical discourse but there is little in the way of humanity about them in the slightest.
There is something kind of hypnotic about all this and the constant clang of the cymbal being struck continuously every second or so throughout the entire running time like an alarm bell going off gives it an even more mesmerising appeal. You have to stick around the entire length of this at least once (I’m on fourth listen) to see if it ever stops, hoping the batteries may run out. (They don’t)
Iron Scorn really is a lesson in brute primitivism that seriously will only appeal to the most obtuse musical listener or Steve Albini who recorded it completest. Perhaps only those who would honestly admit to liking this are those who track down and shell out on this vinyl only release and won’t admit to themselves that it’s a bit shit. Them and Kim Kelly who the PR make great pains to mention championed the act’s previous demo (no offence Kim).
Frankly though this is fucking caveman music!
(3/10 Pete Woods)
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