CD Reviews

KTL

2 | Editions Mego

By SUSANNA BOLLE | May 22, 2007

3.0 Stars

This duo of guitarist Stephen O’Malley of Sunn0))) and Viennese digital noise musician Peter Rehberg (a/k/a Pita) was born when the two scored the soundtrack to a theatrical piece by French performance artist Gisèle Vienne and American novelist Dennis Cooper. Titled Kindertotenlieder (“Songs on the Death of Children”), the piece premiered this past March, but the musical project took on a life of its own. The duo’s KTL debut was a formidable marriage of heavy guitar drones and roiling, abrasive electronics. On their follow-up, O’Malley and Rehberg have upped the ante. Recorded in a 16th-century French manor house and a former abattoir, 2 begins in relative calm with the spare, fine-textured “Game,” all manipulated feedback and swirling, bell-like tones. The first funereal beats of “Theme,” however, lead to a slow, inexorable crescendo — a thunderous roar of processed organ and guitar that’s both shudderingly bleak and spine-tinglingly cathartic. The heaviest, blackest metal moment is “Abattoir,” a grinding guitar dirge. But the closer, the softly elegiac “Snow 2,” is no less ferocious in its stark beauty.

Related: Crusaders, Clothes call, Dead men walking, More

Crusaders
Broadway is strewn with the banana peel of Arthurian legend.
Clothes call
The musical version of The Full Monty comes across as bawdy and hilarious as intended in this version by Center Stage Productions.
Dead men walking
Hamlet’s “undiscovered country” is the subject of Nobel laureate Harold Pinter’s No Man’s Land.
Absolute Wilson
Back in 1991, in the American Repertory Theatre production of When We Dead Awaken , Robert Wilson’s musical based on the dour Henrik Ibsen play, there was a moment when the cast, led by Honey Cole, started a cakewalk line while chanting the play’s title over and over again. Watch the trailer for Absolute Wilson (QuickTime)
Staging Strider
Frodo sings! And for that matter, so do Aragorn, Arwen Evenstar, the pitiful Gollem, and some 55 inhabitants of Middle-earth in the world premiere of the musical The Lord of the Rings .
Cause for pause
The Ogunquit Playhouse’s final show of the season is a musical for the ages — for the ages, that is, of about 45 to 60.
Suppressing the urge
Some scholars estimate an end to our current age, the “Era of Expansion,”as early as 2050.
Lovely, dark, and deep
Everyone’s tale winds up among the trees in Good Theater’s enchanting and absolutely virtuoso production of Into the Woods , Stephen Sondheim’s clever musical elaboration upon our favorite fairy tales, seamlessly directed by Brian Allen at the St. Lawrence.
Improv Asylum presents Scott Brown: The Musical
Should US Senator Scott Brown ever find any downtime between crucial votes on the future of this nation and hand-modeling gigs, he may want to flex his melodrama muscles.
Playful summer
Bloody, edgy, original, iambic — this summer’s theater line-up fits some fine descriptors. Here are some of my picks.
Light lifting
Come summertime, when you’re sunning on the sand all day and evening rolls around, sometimes the theater equivalent of light beach reading is just what you need.
Less

Topics: CD Reviews , Entertainment, Musicals, Dennis Cooper

| More

Friends' Activity

Popular

Most Viewed

See more deals

view all

[ 02/13 ] "Aphrodite and the Gods of Love" @ Museum of Fine Arts

[ 02/13 ] "Processes and Dreams" @ Panopticon Gallery

[ 02/13 ] "Artists' Books: Books by Artists" @ Boston Athenæum

ARTICLES BY SUSANNA BOLLE

ASSAULT AND BATTERIES | February 20, 2009
After a brief stint in Pittsburgh, guitarist and electronic musician GEOFF MULLEN is back in his native Rhode Island, and the New England music scene is so much the better for it.

SO MUCH IN STORE | February 10, 2009
Australia's the NECKS are the sort of band who thwart classification.

A COMPROVISATIONAL WHAT? | February 02, 2009
Local saxophonist and electronic-musician JORRIT DIJKSTRA combines a variety of styles ranging from jazz to electro-acoustic improv and noise to create his own emotive and often idiosyncratic music.

WINTRY MIX | January 26, 2009
There are so many interesting and unusual musical happenings this week, it's almost more than this little column can bear.

RARE FREQUENCIES: CALLITHUMPIAN CONSORT, THURSTON MOORE AND BILL NACE | January 20, 2009
Although composer JOHN CAGE is best known for 4'33" of silence, he could raise a ruckus when the mood struck.

See all articles by: SUSANNA BOLLE

CD Reviews

KTL

Grimes | Visions

Brite Futures | Dark Past

Chairlift | Something

The Mighty Mighty Bosstones | The Magic of Youth

Charlotte Gainsbourg | Stage Whispers