The metal and punk worlds are dotted with prolific multi instrumentalists for whom recording and releasing new material appears to be an obsession rather than a chore. Often the adjective “mentalist” shines through out of the description due to the composer’s manic recordings and genre shifting. One such person is Maurice De Jong aka Mories. A quick wikicheck and the guy has released 93 collections not including compilations and not including releases when he was part of a band. 93! Ninety fucking three!
Reviewing this new Gnaw Their Tongues has sent me down a rabbit hole with regard to De Jong. Gnaw Their Tongues is a project that often gets cited online when people are searching for the most extreme music, when they want harshness to bludgeon their bruised brains. I have recently been listening to the highly abrasive anxiety inducing Methwitch so thought a delve in Gnaw Their Tongues was worth a go.
My only other experience was listening to N.V the quite brilliantly disturbing collaboration between Gnaw Their Tongues and Dragged Into Sunlight. I gave it another listen this morning reminding myself of the crushing bleakness the two acts created plus the revulsion I feel when hearing the chilling clips of serial killer and rapist Micheal Ross that permeate the record. I knew I was not in for an easy listen with The Cessation of Suffering.
Imagine my surprise then, when I hit play at the gym for a hated cardio session to wobble off some inches of flab and found myself transfixed and transported into a zen like state by this album. From the get go Mories cuts the listener in two. I do not know what the concept of the album is – the accompanying blurb states that this, the 10th album seeks to “mirror the horrible state of the world and inner turmoil”.
Yes, it does – but that is only half of the story. Alongside the harsh vocals which switch from black metal rasps to screams to – is that a baby’s cry? – there are haunting and beautiful melodies that soothe the listener and make the brutal cacophony become gentle white noise to glide along. This is the aural equivalent of a spank with a spiked paddle and then the stroke of the velvet glove to sooth the welt after.
Ooooooooooookaaaaay – sorry about that wander off into Mr Greys red room.
The opening track “Dreamless” mixes echoing chant-like vocals which induce a tantric style state and scratchy harsh electronics which push pins in your ears and tickle your eyeballs with toothpicks. On headphones I found this cathartic and it helped me zone out the pain in my shins and knees on the treadmill, blasting from the speakers on my stereo it gives me the heebie jeebies. My second listen to this album is very different to my first and I can see, that for me this is a record to be enjoyed on headphones whilst working out rather than endured whilst sitting in my home.
When I say endured, I do not mean, by any means, that I do not like this album when listening on my stereo- far from it. Just it gives me the sort of prickly feeling that large amounts of caffeine do. It’s thrilling but I keep feeling the need to pause and take a breather from the onslaught – which seems to make it even more intense when it starts again. “Veneer” sounds like a soundscape from hell – a mix of bludgeoning electronics, horror soundtrack and bleak bleak Black metal. Imagine the soundtrack to Event Horizons deleted hell scenes – this would fit. It is like a swarm of AI bees bursting from your chest and forcing their proboscis into your eyes looking for nectar. “Salvation Body” starts with a piano that sounds like it was found in your primary school’s assembly hall before a crushing swathe of electronic pulses and pained screams and possible baby wails turns this nostalgia into PTSD. The piece transforms into the title track and the piano becomes more and more detuned and deranged and the industrial beat becomes bouncy like giant Taiko played through a bank of distortion pedals. I find myself transfixed like a rubbernecker next to a motorway crash. The percussion throughout this track is stirring and the final crash of cymbals gives a payoff of relief.
A futuristic hellscape is next with “Mensenlucht” which translates to Human Smell. A cinematic voiceover then a beat that is more at home in gabber lies atop a maelstrom of scratchy electronica, industrial carnage, back masked vocals and hellish screams. Ulp! What can further ramp up the horror? How about that quintessential musical device the pipe organ. “Vengeful Spit” mixes those epic macabre keys with echoey electronic timpani, and what sounds like a sandstorm played through a Marshall stack and the roar of a Djinn. There are euphoric moments of major chord keyboards just to make you realise that there is some good in the world but that is just a glimpse of the blue sky as you are dragged back into the eddy of filth again.
“Met huid en Haar” – With Skin and Hair. Takes a breakbeat and cuts it up with a ragged razor blade, layers the sound of an android torture chamber on top and pounds away at it with a blood and skin caked industrial press. Fuck…… This is becoming an out of body experience.
You know that poster for “Last House on the Left”? “Keep repeating to yourself – it’s only a movie”. Well, it is not hyperbole for me to type that I am almost at that point, substituting movie for album. I really am feeling anxious and on edge as I listen to this album for the second time. I know it’s only mp3’s coming though my amp but the effect these noises are having on me is quite profound. The rumbling noise of “Throatrot” has, at its heart, a beautiful singing bowl melody which lies beneath static feedback, white noise and brutal noise electronics. By the time the more traditional sounding heavy industrial noise of “The Departure of the Light” begins I am given succour by the relatively more comfortable Godflesh sounds. It is still as heavy as all heck though and becomes more deranged throughout. The use of what sounds like mad preacher/carnival barker samples adds to the unhinged fell as does what sounds like a UFO beaming up a cow in a 50’s sci fi B movie.
So the thrill ride/ordeal/experience delete as you will come’s to an end with “Messen” – Measure. Massive deep space vibes underpin this mad sound collage. It reminds me of the feel of EL-P’s “I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead” album – big Bladerunner vibes but a futuristic planet filled with replicants who are wearing the skin of torn up humans. It must end soon?
When it does I feel that euphoric rush that you get after a long session being tattooed. You know you have experienced something profound that has changed you. There were parts where I had to grit my teeth and get through it but I know that I will be back for more. Probably tomorrow and probably on headphones.
This Mories is a sadistic genius.
(9/10 Matt Mason)
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