Keiji Haino – The Book of “Eternity Set Aflame”
This CD contains 70 minutes of music from 1995 in the form of three long, untitled tracks of spiritual lift-off. Track one is an 18-minute solo electric guitar, pedals and amp stack overload with tons of subtle, high-pitched string wailing occurring under washes of non-generic feedback–as always, “not using overdubbing” as the liner notes say–ending with a very jarring and painful series of aluminum slashes. Track two is a 12-minute, ugly / beautiful, brooding lake of electronics that is excellent for a long night swim alone. The supremely tortured vocals appearing later make the hair on my goosebumps stand on end.
Clocking in at 39 minutes, track three is another extended foray into Keiji Haino’s infinite interior and our reality’s infinite exterior. It’s a swirling galaxy of endless solo guitar mangling that starts off in the heavy improv mode, with his patented stuttered / spluttered vocals thrown in, and eventually coalesces into an incredibly dense electrical storm. The last 10 minutes mellow into an incredibly moving, quiet cloud of amp hum that sounds like a billion year-old signal coming from some dead radio station on the far edge of the universe. Near the end, Keiji Haino’s voice—now so beautiful and gentle—cuts straight to the core as the sound fades. A nice, smeared photo of Haino playing guitar adorns the cover.
Label: Forced Exposure Catalog Number: FE 036 Format: CD Packaging: Jewel case Tracks: 3 Total Time: 70:17 Country: United States Released: 1995 Related Artists: Fushitsusha More: Official, Poison Pie, PSF, Wikipedia
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