Gangleri – musicreviews

Finally a new release on Galakthorrö and “Miasma” is very much a Galakthorrö release. A bit old November Növelet, a bit of Maska Genetik and a lot of Haus Arafna. As a matter of fact, if this would have been released under the name of Haus Arafna, I would have believed this to be a Haus Arafna album instantly. “Miasma” would come perfectly after “Butterfly” with again softer industrial noise and angstpop. The sound, the structure, the vocals, everything reminds of Haus Arafna, the only thing missing is mrs. Arafna. Should this have been a Haus Arafna album, it would have been their best; man, what a great album “Miasma” is! Exactly what I needed. Industrial rhythms, creaking noises, dark drones, deep vocals. Not every track is perfect, but most tracks are great enough to compensate for the one or two less-great tracks. Hopefully mr. and mrs. Arafna will soon take up the task to release an even better album.
Links: Herz Jühning, Galakthorrö

Since the last new album is already 5 years old, I decided to buy some older material and ‘work my way backwards’ to see to how early I like Haus Arafna. “Version 2000″ the cover of “Children of God” says, I gues the first pressing was gone rapidly. “Children Of God” “includes the mega-hit Last Dream Of Jesus” and is musically and thematically (artwork) quite extreme. This album is another step forward to the great sound of later material. There are some hardly distorted rhythms in some tracks, others are relatively tranquil and ‘discoïsh’, such as the great “Anatomy of a murder”. Leaving out the really extreme material of the earlier days, Haus Arafna is rapidly becoming one of my favourite exponents of extreme electronics.
Links: Haus Arafna, Galakthorrö

Originally released in 1995 as “Blut / Trilogie des Blutes”, this 2006 rerelease contains “Nachblutung” as bonus. This results in a nice length of about an hour. Even though this is some of the earlier material, this album is not as extreme as Haus Arafna can get. Mind you, this cd is still a lot more industrial noise than “Butterfly”! The music of Haus Arafna will fall hard on the average music listener, but I personally like it a lot. It is extreme, especially in some tracks of an earlier release such as this, but structured and nicely rhythmical. I must add that I am no fond of the very early more chaotic noise sound, but the tracks here were a good step in the right direction. I never really got to buy more of Haus Arafna than the magnificent “Butterfly“, but this puts me back on track.
Links: Haus Arafna, Galakthorrö

Ok ok, I take back my words that Galakthorrö projects tend to sound like eachother. Hermann Kopp is something completely different from any Galakthorrö release. In fact, it is different from anything that you ever heard. Using a violin, sampling it and by adding samples and sounds, Hermann Kopp creates strange avantgardistic soundscapes and sound experiments. However the label speaks of “sublime violin playing” I sometimes have the idea that it is out of tone, but that aside. The music is hard to describe and after quite a few listenings, I still cannot really get into the music. There is but one great track, the rest is just alright or downright boring. Nope, this is not the best release from this great label, but definately something different.
Links: Hermann Kopp, Galakthorrö

I had to wait a little longer for this 7″ than I hoped, but I least I got one of the 806 copies. Four tracks, two seem a bit like an into and outro, two others are more full tracks with the sound of the tranquil tracks from “Magic“. The sound is more melancholic )more “Kalte Welle”?) and not as surprising or as good as that cd. NN (and Haus Arafna and Galakthorrö) keeps making its own strange sound, so I am still curious what the future will bring.

I have had this compilation on the computer for some time, but good things I want to have ‘for real’. This compilation celebrated 10 years of Galakthorrö and opens with an old style harsch industrial noise track of Haus Arafna. The second track is also for Haus Arafna, but this time more the ‘new style’. Subliminal continues with two harsch noise tracks, but things get more tranquil with Karl Runau. Then follow two magnificent tracks that were mostly the reason for me buying this cd. Maska Genetik is unfortunately no longer on Galakthorrö and even seems to cease to excist, but his two noisy disco-industrial tracks are very much Galakthorrö and some of the best tracks this label released. Of course the compilation would not be complete without November Növelet, two great “angstpop” (and/or “kalte welle”?) tracks in the “From Heaven On Earth” style. Unfortunately the running time is only 38 minutes…

Those who fear that Galakthorrö is becoming soft with the newer sound of Haus Arafna and November Növelet, releases of Herman Kopp and Herz Jühning can rest assured tonight: Subliminal made another total noise album. The first two tracks lets you get used to the fact just mentioned, but from track three on, you get some rather harsch noise with distorted vocals. Subliminal has released another album on Galakthorrö (“Gracebudd” 2000), but I don’t know it and they appear on the excellent “Galakthorrö – Kosmoloko” compilation (2004, which I have no legal copy of yet, so I haven’t reviewed it). “Coping” reminds quite a bit of the harscher side of Haus Arafna here and there. I wonder how it comes that Galakthorrö projects somehow all seem to have a sound based on whatever sound mr. and mrs. Arafna have produced. Does the label manage to track down such projects, are they involved in them theirselves, it this a group of friends working in the same studio? Whether it is noise, “angstpop” or “Kalte Welle”, it is not too hard to recognise a Galakthorrö sound in projects. As long as it is good, this does not matter of course. Subliminal is surely no Haus Arafna copy and like I said: if people think that Haus Arafna got too soft, they can now buy “Coping”.
Links: Subliminal, Galakthorrö

A long time I didn’t really know Haus Arafna, their other project or their label. Almost five years ago I decided to buy a Haus Arafna album and reading back my review of that time I found the album just fine at the time. I guess the cd grew on me, since I consider “Butterfly” to be a masterpiece nowadays. I didn’t come to buy more Haus Arafna music, but apparently started to look for their material on the P2P network that I use sometimes (rarely actually). I have some other Haus Arafna albums on the computer by now, some are nice, some are too noisy and none is as good as “Butterfly”. I suppose in the process of looking for Haus Arafna material, I also ran into the sublime album “Magic” of November Növelet, which I bought immediately. Somewhere along the line I also pulled “From Heaven On Earth” off the web and this album is not only definately good enough to buy, but also still available even though it’s quite old. “From Heaven On Earth” is not as much a disco cd as “Magic”, but has more of that odd Galakthorrö style of music: minimalistic, a bit ambient, a bit industrial, some soft rhythms and a lot of weird sounds. The style is dark and charming, elusive and provocative and most of all: very original. “From Heaven On Earth” could be an album for people who don’t like the harscher side of Haus Arafna (you just have to get used to it!) and perhaps also for people who find “Magic” too poppy, but “More Satanic Heroes” (1994) too harsch. It’s quite a typical Galakthorrö release, but as long as it’s only Galakthorrö releasing this kind of stuff, I don’t mind the ‘typicallity’.
There is a 7″ just released, I hope to be able to review it soon. Two of the four tracks can be listened on the band’s Myspace, check out the links.
Links: November Növelet, Galakthorrö

This rather old release was the second project on Galakthorrö not being mr. and mrs. Arafna themselves. Galakthorrö seems to use the following terms to describe their releases: “angstpop”, “Kalte Welle” and “Intensiv Elektronik”. About the first term, I recently wrote a few thoughts. The second term is German for “cold wave”, so I guess that makes a Galakthorrö version of that style. I don’t know what is meant with the last term, but who knows it refers to Karl Runau.
Karl Runau goes from minimalistic ambient with some rhythm to bleepy electronics. It surely fits on Galakthorrö and perhaps the sound reminds a bit of some November Növelet tracks here and there. “Beyond Frequencies” is a nice album that could definately appeal to people who listen to minimalistic electronics outside the industrial scene too. The computer sounds have been popular in some techno movements a while ago, so… Anyway, something less noisy than many other Galakthorrö releases but of course very strange.
Galakthorrö

I probably don’t have to tell you, but November Növelet is another project of Haus Arafna and Galakthorrö is mr. and mrs. Arafna’s label. It is only since a few years that I got to know and appreciate Haus Arafna. I hadn’t really listed to November Növelet yet, but what I heard it seemed that this was the Arafna harsch noise project while Haus Arafna evolved towards a more accessible sound. This assumption turns out to be wrong, because “Magic” is more ‘easy listening’ than anything that has been released under the monicker Haus Arafna (as far as I know). The album opens with minimalistic and even atmospheric sounds as it can be only made by the couple Arafna, but as the album continues the sound goes more towards 80′ies synthpop with of course an odd twist. It seems that the Arafna’s undergo a similar evolution as for example Thorofon who also started as a harsch noise project, but later got a sound that some call “antipop”. This album of November Növelet will appeal to people who enjoy the last Thorofon album, Dogpop, Geneviève Pasquier and the like. Also where in earlier days mr. and mrs. Arafna were always shown with gasmasks on, they now can be seen in both projects with their real faces and for “Magic” even with an “Austin Powers”-like photoshoot! I must say that I enjoy this development in industrial music, the older the musicians get, the crazier it seems. The music is easy to listen to, but strange enough to avoid the masses (also because of the names they are released under I guess), so if you share that weird musical sense of humour, you might want to get a copy of “Magic”.
Link: November Növelet, Galakthorrö
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