So many seem to be getting the horror bug at the moment and either realising their own versions of film themes or interpreting soundtracks to their own definitions. Some of these are inventive, some are unique and others are no more than tributes to the greats. Most film fans will have their own favourites and have those OST discs or vinyl in their collection stemming back to the days when they were first owning the actual movies on VHS tapes. I don’t know about you but some of the most plagiarised themes originally wowed fans in the golden age of fright films back in the 70’s and how many more versions of the main themes from The Exorcist and Halloween do we need to hear, even if it is from some cult BM musician from somewhere in Eastern Europe? Still, you can’t help but listen to them and with so many films and composers being rediscovered and put out with the music by boutique labels, there’s a wealth of more obscure artists out there ripe for the picking and perhaps we should be turning attention to the likes of Daniel White, Stelvio Cipriani and Bruno Nicolai rather than the household names.
So here we have Southern Records supremo and renowned musician Greg Anderson getting his turn. You shouldn’t need a list of all the bands and projects he has been involved in and adopting the name The Lord here seems a natural. Again, it’s the legends he is focusing on namely John Carpenter and Bernard Hermann but these are not covers and are described as “cinematic landscapes, heavy with tension.” Also, the “dramatic woodland scenery from the Pacific Northwest and beyond and his wanderings within are inspirational so I was expecting to be pitched into a place partway between ‘The Evil Dead,’ Just Before Dawn and ‘Antichrist’ perhaps and set myself up for an intriguing and hopefully somewhat original listening experience which I hoped would leave me with frayed nerves.
Well, it did that alright but the nerves were more agitated than anything else and it was the repetitive nature of everything here that put me on edge. Firstly, we have a ‘Theme’ of snaking guitar riff over throbbing keys. Yep, Michael Myers has spent several decades stalking the town of Haddonfield and it’s obvious that is what Anderson is looking at here. Somehow, he has managed to make a 4-minute number seemingly last as long as the damn franchise. It’s dull, boring and seemingly endless. The obviously referential ‘Church Of Herrmann’ delivers into a funeral home via organ work and is suitably peaceful in its funereal approach. Nothing new in the slightest here but it’s effectively atmospheric if not Vertigo inducing. The two-part ‘Lefthanded Lullaby’ goes for the artists approach with throbbing frequencies and he has had more experience with these that Ed Wood had making B movies. Perhaps it might work with visual accompaniment but as a stand-alone piece of music it just gradually fades into insignificance before coming back and going on and on. Turgid throbbing guitar does nothing to really lift me out the stupor and frankly as it focuses on the same riff it’s a big Sun No))) from me.
By the song titles the second half seems to concentrate on the arboreal side of things. How an emergency services siren gets through the ‘Forest Wake’ is beyond me but that and jagged, slicing guitar riffs repeated over and over again is frankly more damn annoying than anything. ‘Deciduous’ is just a faint humming and as exciting as trying to watch a tree grow, cue a continuation into ‘Old Growth’ and a prolonged build up into gradual monotonous bass distortion. So far it’s been instrumental but we have the croaking addition of Atilla Csihar on (thankfully) final number ‘Triumph Of The Oak.’ Not even he can lift this one out of the quagmire especially as now Anderson is playing the same riff through the duration like a kid getting to grips with guitar hero and thinking he’s a rock god.
Sorry but this is really bad! There is one good thing about it though, the excellent Dan Seagrave cover art which really does not deserve the ignominy of being attached to this awful vanity project. Apparently our Lord but certainly not our saviour is planning a second album of material before the year is out. You have been warned.
(2/10 Pete Woods)
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