Contrastate – A Thousand Badgers In Labour

Not bad album, but not much good in my opinion ... The stolen sample from Popul Vuh not only is a theft, but it goes on without modifications for at least three tracks, leaving a sense of "already heard". Also, sincerely, for being from 1990, I find the album too much minimal with a not much experimental sound ... there's not much aside from that sample, and spoken voices should have been more treated in my opinion.

I defy you to listen to "Perhaps It Comes Out Of The Black Sea" and not conclude this track is a high-water-mark for dark ambiance. Contrastate set the standard way back when, and very few have even come close. Jonathan Grieve and Stephen Meixner are the "Lennon and McCartney" of the genre.

Flawless dark ambiance without peer. Forget the CMI roster. Set aside Raison D'etre. Contrastate are the real deal. Organic swirling textures, haunting spoken vocals, dark subjects, wicked humor and blackness...it's all here. "A Thousand Badgers In Labour" will take you places few would dare to venture. Claustrophobic...dense...shimmering...beautiful. This release is art. This release is not commerce. This release is a must. "Whilst I rape your dreams..."

To me it is a dark, mysterious work, metamorphosising from Stygian soundscape to Stygian soundscape. Poetry, read in a sombre, unemotional voice which blends chameleon-like with the music, punctuates the sound now & again, adding to, rather than upsetting, the dark ambience.

The loop, or sample, which runs through all of the first track, and resurfaces in the second seems to be taken from "Brüder Des Schattens - Söhne Des Lichts" - the POPUL VUH "Nosferatu" soundtrack, but this in no way disturbs the enjoyment of listening to this album - on the contrary, the pre-absorbed itmge of the melodramatic Vampyre figure probably adds to the atmosphere, and consequently, the enjoyment. Other recognizable pieces which float through the black morass include a snatch of GRIEGs "Hall Of The Mountain King", and what I think is part of "The Hitcher"s dialogue.

To compare the overall sound to other works I know, I'd say it wouldn't be too much the Cuckoo-in-the-Sparrows-nest put onto an album by GILBERT & LEWIS, something like the first couple of DOME albums, but much darker. It would make a decent soundtrack to a well-made H. P. LOVECRAFT film - it suggests the sane creeping corruption & insidious terror. I hope these words will encourage you to seek out a copy - its well worth it. Matt black & brooding.

Originally reviewed for Soft Watch.