For a long noise wasn’t my kind of music. Chaotic highpitched noise, I still can’t listen to most of it. I don’t know if it has to do with the years, or with the fact that the genre became better, but there are quite some noise and power electronics projects that I do like nowadays and reviews in this genre can be found on Monas.nl more often. It is only now and then that I run into something that I really like. One of such projects was Propergol from the sunny France that I got to know when Tesco released his “Renegade” album. Propergol has released more material on Nuit et Brouillard, Malignant, etc. and appears on many compilations of which I bought some hoping that there is more of this kind of noise. Jérôme Nougaillon founded his own label of which I ran into the website a few times. Hermetique found other projects more or less in the same vein and these projects can be found on this great and cheap compilation which comes in a wonderfull thin DVD case. The title probably refers to David Cronenberg’s “Videodrome” film which seems to be one of Nougaillon’s favorite films (the Propergol track is called “Emotional Rescue Show”, samples from “Videodrome” can be found on his cds). “A Reassuring Voice…” opens with a very dark low-frequency track from Post Scriptvm from the USA of which another cd that was released by Somanbulant Corpse is reviewed elsewhere. Next up is a new-signed project called nEGAPADRES.3.3. with a weird noise track. Dusk of Hope has two tracks to come to their 10 minutes, this time very much noise, like Ex.Order. The first track is great, the second is alright. Sea-Green Series is another project of Nougaillon.This track is a great dark and noisy soundscape, leading up to more extreme sounds. Immediately recognisable is Propergol. This projects comes out best on a 70 minute cd, but “Emotional Rescue Show” is dark and threatening like we got used to of this project. With Radiodrama things get more noisy again, industrial even. Clear sounds, samples, a heavy rhythm and then noise; a really great track. The last track is for Old-Iron Fence. This track is much like a more tranquil Propergol track. This is the one minor thing about “A Reassuring Voice…”. Like other projects seem to be inspired by Propergol, the projects on this compilation are exceptionally heavily influenced by Nougaillon. Old-Iron Fence can easily be mistaken for Propergol, Radiodrama has similar samples with similar effects, like some of the other projects. This is okay if people find inspiration and original paths for themselves in the future, but I hope we won’t suddenly get a booming ‘Hermetique-scene’ with projects all sounding the same. This has happened enough in the scene already.On the other hand, with similar sounds it becomes easier for reviewers like myself to described this strange ‘new’ kind of music. Heathen Harvest used the term “cinematic dark ambient/noise/industrial”, I myself earlier used “sophisticated noise”, “noisescapes” and similar descriptions. ‘The Hermetique sound’ this will be, like we have the ‘CMI sound’ in dark ambient. Anyway, something new, fresh, dark and great and Hermetique seems to be the label on the hunt for projects in this vein. There are ‘hijackers on the road’ (as we say here), since my good pal Sistrenatus was signed to Cold Spring. No worries though, Hermetique currently has four cds available (Radiodrama, Post Scriptvm, Dusk Of Hope, nEGAPADRES.3.3. and this compilation) and Propergol has come up with 7 albums in 10 years. Final note, be sure to check out the wonderfull Hermetique website with many mp3s, wallpapers and a couple of great ‘trailers’! <28/4/06><4>
v/a * A Reassuring Voice On The Television (cd 2006 hermetique)
Tags:Hermetique