i have one word for you: dronevil
another one: megatone

Dronevil is a fantastic record.

Philosopher's Stone.

Reuber - "Rehig Blut"



"This is one of those albums which goes on forever, but with the pleasant companionship of days passing and the changes of the quality of light and temperature on one side, and the intensity of a nightmare storm battering on the other. The title is German for Keep Cool, and the long slow unwind of electronic tones is certainly chilled out to a specific degree of mellowness - at least at first it is. The circling high pitches of "Ruhig Blut A" take their twenty minutes (one side of the vinyl edition) to swap stereo channels, swooping and diving through the sound picture with tranquil ease as teensy synth pulsations make their entrance and meander in concert with sundry squeaks and gentle sputters. Calmness is acheived. Rhythms are hinted at, pass though almost imperceptible bass phases; calmness never quite fades, just is...

The second side is anything but calm. "Ruhig Blut B" presents the beat of effects units intermeshing on the dubwise Electro-Autobahn, stepping the mood up through several slow gear stages into the hypnotic plasma generated by phase, flange and delay. The sparse electronic progression soon becomes overwhelming while remaining true to the minimalist ideal, churning and writhing along the route. There's a trebly inevitabilty to the gradual transformation on the basic rhythm; mid-range incursions make for a deeper sound, and when the distending groans kick in, listeners would be advised to hang onto their lunch as things begin to get turbulent. Still, underneath it all, the structure remains something to cling on to, and it's defintiely of benefit under what becomes an endurance test; like a rollercoaster but without the need for all that tedious mucking about actually defying gravity - and one with breath-taking gaps and power surges for extra discomfort just when it all seems to get bearable. The closest piece of repetetive electronic churning this intense is probably to be found courtesy of "Tunnel Of Goats" on Coil's gargantuan gut-wrencher Constant Shallowness Leads To Evil, if that gives any idea quite how monolithic the noisescape becomes.

Fortunately for the CD edition, it has a nicely quiet outro, "Schlaf Gut" ("Sleep Well") to calm things down as a bonus track. Everyone else will just have to pick themselves up from the floor immediately in search of tranquilty, or failing that, keep having a nice long lie down to recover."

I have no idea where they are from but Starving Weirdos are one of my favourite drone groups.

They have released an album on yellow swans jyrk label as well as well as Australian label sound&fury.

Just to be a bitch,
it's called "Ruhig Blut"
which means "calm blood"

ah, been meaning to check out their shit... thanx for reminding me...

No they're not. I agree there's some bad things in their music but there are also a lot of great elements and tracks

I always heard loveliescrushing as sounding like more of a Flying Saucer Attack/MBV type of affair. They made at least one record that I enjoyed quite a lot.

FSA was okay, they kind of first introduced me the idea of hometaping and not fucking with sound quality too much.

I'm guessing a fair few people have already mentioned these - but I'm too tired to read all the other posts (awful, I know!), but:
Phill Niblock
LaMonte Young (those two were big pioneers in drone)
Earth (Dylan Carlson is a genius. Most people seem to prefer Earth 2, but personally I rate Broken Sunn Amps and Smashed Guitars, especially the first track).

For more Sonic Youth orientated stuff try:
Lee Ranaldo's 'Amarillo Ramp' for Robert Smithson album - the title track is 30 minutes of beautiful noise.
Also, Jim O'Rourke has a few good ones - mostly recently you should check out Mizu No Nai Umi on the Headz label. That's pretty special.

All of those make my head feel like its about explode at times. This is a good thing, by the way.

sound characters

Where do you guys find this stuff? I can't find any of it anywhere, not in record stores, not on myspace, or on limewire...

Mp3 blogs are a goldmine for this sort of music.

the very definition of good music.


http://www.aquariusrecords.org
http://www.forcedexposure.com

yes on myspace, look hard, there's lot's of stuff labeled "ambient" that are really drone.

it was on the old board.

Some drone records that blew my mind recently:
Pelt - Ayahuasca
Starving Weirdos - s/t
Khanate - Capture & Release
Sunroof! - Silver Bear Mist

i think most of the bases have been covered here.