Artist: Todesstoss
Title: S/T and Sauglingshangwerk Aushilfsheins
Type: 2x albums
Label: Traumorgane
Despite a string of past releases, German surrealist depressive black mentalists Todesstoss have previously slipped me by until these two albums landed in my post-box. The first clocking in at over 80 minutes and the second a comparatively short 45 minutes, this is certainly quite a challenging listening experience especially given that one could watch a relatively lengthy feature-film in the time it takes to play cover to cover. It makes sense to begin with the chronological forerunner, which is self-titled and, the longer of the two, is certainly an endurance test. Is that a good, or a bad thing? Well, I’m still undecided. Opening track ‘Die Autoaggressive Wut der Verzweiflung’ sets the scene and lays down a foundation that is both discordant and depressive and steeped in distortion. It’s grim, it’s bleak and utterly colourless and this is the general vibe I get from this album. A barren landscape that is drained of all colour and life at times lulls one into a state of indifference with its numbing repetition, which makes things all the more unsettling and terrifying when the demons leap out from the darkness to really shake you up. Suddenly a riff comes hurtling at you through the speakers, mechanically churning like a high-speed train with no intention of breaking.
The caustic, tortured vocals sound hellish and totally nasty. On ‘Ich blute Zerstörung’ frontman Martin Lang emits something akin to those deathly pig-squeals sounding vile and inhuman to put it politely; extreme is an incredibly appropriate word in this instance. This track works up a tense ambience, depressive and the guitar sound creates that kind of distance that just puts into aural form that sense of feeling totally engulfed by darkness and disconnected from everything around you. ‘Schlangentau’ has a far eerier vibe and by now I realise one has been sucked into this twisted and terrifying place too far to escape. This number is really unsettling, with its spectral wails and cries and strange noises swirling around in the darkness, evil lurking all around you. The combination of nerve-shredding terror and soul-sucking misery seems at one point unending, and by the way don’t make the mistake I made of trying to go to sleep listening to this album, this part woke me up feeling rather like a surreal nightmare. The tormented cries here and on ‘Endbeginn’ are that of a wretched soul condemned to eternal torment. It truly highlights the emptiness of existence, the drudgery, hopelessness and despair of the “gift” they call life…(6.5)
Which brings me neatly to album #2; Sauglingshangwerk Aushilfsheins (yup that really rolls off the tongue). This is a neat little two-track concept album based on the fictional ‘Temporary J Black’; a maniac who stalks the streets in a big old truck snatching babies and killing them. Antinatalism is rather a taboo subject, unless you are at a meeting of the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement, perhaps… but such philosophical stance will win you few brownie points in our society. Gift of life – well life is a miserable sack of shit and from the moment of birth we are utterly doomed and one thing the works of Arthur Schopenhauer and in particular Carl Jung have taught me it is that giving birth is the absolute cruellest act a human being can ever do. Anyway, before I get carried away ranting about socialization and the gradual erosion of the Self I shall stay with the music.
This album to me seems more sinister, right down to the creepy artwork which is also done by main man Martin Lang. There is a totally unhinged sense of nihilism to this album, as the scraping, scrambling depressive wall of sound on ‘Sauglingshängwerk Aushilfsheins’ builds and builds becoming more intense and impervious. The booming bass lurks in the darkness and one can synesthetically envision the black butchering figure stalking the streets in search of fresh meat for the mobile abattoir. Scenes of suffering and horror can be heard here through panicked screams and the innocent cries of babies, and one can imagine chaos and panic in the town square, women running for cover as they are hunted down indiscriminately. Lang’s squawks are really psychotic and sinister and really are the icing on the cake here. After a while we are lulled into a dark hypnotic trance, as we maunder through slowly with a thoroughness as though Black is checking every back alley ensuring no baby is spared. It really weaves a sinister yarn that captures the imagination and takes it into a nihilistically nightmarish scenario with no glimmer of hope. (7.5)
Two intriguing albums full of dark, twisted terror and absolute despair. These are both joyless, bleak and jarring, not to mention utterly captivating and delightfully perverse. I now have to check out some older stuff from this band.
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