Search
345 results for “tedivm”
-
Wagakki Band (和楽器バンド) – Yasouemaki (八奏絵巻) (2015, Japan)
Our next spotlight is on number 1011 on The List, submitted by ChrisJagged.
Founded by singer, composer, lyricist, Shigin master, Kenshibu dancer, and classical pianist Suzuhana Yuko, Wagakki Band (和楽器バンド) is named after the traditional Japanese instruments that are prominent in their music, wagakki. Originating out of Suzuhana’s acoustic folk trio Hanafugetsu (which is still active), the band essentially merged with folk punk/visual kei band Crow×Class to result in a 8-member group with a sound that lands somewhere in-between the folk rock and folk metal spheres. Wagakki Band first gained popularity via their adaptations of Vocaloid songs, with their first LP, Vocalo Zanmai (ボカロ三昧) (2014), consisting solely of Vocaloid covers. The album we look at here is their second studio album and first to contain original material. It incorporates methods of Shigin, a traditional poetry form performed/recited in a particular manner, as would their following albums.
Following the release of Yasouemaki, Wagakki Band’s popularity would continue to grow both at home and internationally, and the band would go on to release five more LPs, with Tokyo Singing (2020) featuring a collaboration with Amy Lee of Evanescence. As of the end of 2024, the band has gone on indefinite hiatus.
Even if you, like me, don’t know much about J-rock/J-pop, if you have an interest in folk rock/metal (and love/miss[1] key changes!), this is a really fun band to check out.
Happy listening!
- Here’s a fun Tedium article that was referenced in a toot I saw recently, exploring the demise of the key change in pop music over the last 60 years: “The Death of the Key Change” by Chris Dalla Riva (Nov 9, 2022). The article looks specifically at pop music that hit the Billboard Hot 100 charts so I can’t help but wonder now if the key change is still alive and well in J-pop. Anyone know? ↩︎
#CrowxClass #folkMetal #folkRock #Hanafugetsu #JPop #JRock #music #musicDiscovery #Shigin #SuzuhanaYuko #WagakkiBand
-
Wagakki Band (和楽器バンド) – Yasouemaki (八奏絵巻) (2015, Japan)
Our next spotlight is on number 1011 on The List, submitted by ChrisJagged.
Founded by singer, composer, lyricist, Shigin master, Kenshibu dancer, and classical pianist Suzuhana Yuko, Wagakki Band (和楽器バンド) is named after the traditional Japanese instruments that are prominent in their music, wagakki. Originating out of Suzuhana’s acoustic folk trio Hanafugetsu (which is still active), the band essentially merged with folk punk/visual kei band Crow×Class to result in a 8-member group with a sound that lands somewhere in-between the folk rock and folk metal spheres. Wagakki Band first gained popularity via their adaptations of Vocaloid songs, with their first LP, Vocalo Zanmai (ボカロ三昧) (2014), consisting solely of Vocaloid covers. The album we look at here is their second studio album and first to contain original material. It incorporates methods of Shigin, a traditional poetry form performed/recited in a particular manner, as would their following albums.
Following the release of Yasouemaki, Wagakki Band’s popularity would continue to grow both at home and internationally, and the band would go on to release five more LPs, with Tokyo Singing (2020) featuring a collaboration with Amy Lee of Evanescence. As of the end of 2024, the band has gone on indefinite hiatus.
Even if you, like me, don’t know much about J-rock/J-pop, if you have an interest in folk rock/metal (and love/miss[1] key changes!), this is a really fun band to check out.
Happy listening!
- Here’s a fun Tedium article that was referenced in a toot I saw recently, exploring the demise of the key change in pop music over the last 60 years: “The Death of the Key Change” by Chris Dalla Riva (Nov 9, 2022). The article looks specifically at pop music that hit the Billboard Hot 100 charts so I can’t help but wonder now if the key change is still alive and well in J-pop. Anyone know? ↩︎
#CrowxClass #folkMetal #folkRock #Hanafugetsu #JPop #JRock #music #musicDiscovery #Shigin #SuzuhanaYuko #WagakkiBand
-
Wagakki Band (和楽器バンド) – Yasouemaki (八奏絵巻) (2015, Japan)
Our next spotlight is on number 1011 on The List, submitted by ChrisJagged.
Founded by singer, composer, lyricist, Shigin master, Kenshibu dancer, and classical pianist Suzuhana Yuko, Wagakki Band (和楽器バンド) is named after the traditional Japanese instruments that are prominent in their music, wagakki. Originating out of Suzuhana’s acoustic folk trio Hanafugetsu (which is still active), the band essentially merged with folk punk/visual kei band Crow×Class to result in a 8-member group with a sound that lands somewhere in-between the folk rock and folk metal spheres. Wagakki Band first gained popularity via their adaptations of Vocaloid songs, with their first LP, Vocalo Zanmai (ボカロ三昧) (2014), consisting solely of Vocaloid covers. The album we look at here is their second studio album and first to contain original material. It incorporates methods of Shigin, a traditional poetry form performed/recited in a particular manner, as would their following albums.
Following the release of Yasouemaki, Wagakki Band’s popularity would continue to grow both at home and internationally, and the band would go on to release five more LPs, with Tokyo Singing (2020) featuring a collaboration with Amy Lee of Evanescence. As of the end of 2024, the band has gone on indefinite hiatus.
Even if you, like me, don’t know much about J-rock/J-pop, if you have an interest in folk rock/metal (and love/miss[1] key changes!), this is a really fun band to check out.
Happy listening!
- Here’s a fun Tedium article that was referenced in a toot I saw recently, exploring the demise of the key change in pop music over the last 60 years: “The Death of the Key Change” by Chris Dalla Riva (Nov 9, 2022). The article looks specifically at pop music that hit the Billboard Hot 100 charts so I can’t help but wonder now if the key change is still alive and well in J-pop. Anyone know? ↩︎
#CrowxClass #folkMetal #folkRock #Hanafugetsu #JPop #JRock #music #musicDiscovery #Shigin #SuzuhanaYuko #WagakkiBand
-
Wagakki Band (和楽器バンド) – Yasouemaki (八奏絵巻) (2015, Japan)
Our next spotlight is on number 1011 on The List, submitted by ChrisJagged.
Founded by singer, composer, lyricist, Shigin master, Kenshibu dancer, and classical pianist Suzuhana Yuko, Wagakki Band (和楽器バンド) is named after the traditional Japanese instruments that are prominent in their music, wagakki. Originating out of Suzuhana’s acoustic folk trio Hanafugetsu (which is still active), the band essentially merged with folk punk/visual kei band Crow×Class to result in a 8-member group with a sound that lands somewhere in-between the folk rock and folk metal spheres. Wagakki Band first gained popularity via their adaptations of Vocaloid songs, with their first LP, Vocalo Zanmai (ボカロ三昧) (2014), consisting solely of Vocaloid covers. The album we look at here is their second studio album and first to contain original material. It incorporates methods of Shigin, a traditional poetry form performed/recited in a particular manner, as would their following albums.
Following the release of Yasouemaki, Wagakki Band’s popularity would continue to grow both at home and internationally, and the band would go on to release five more LPs, with Tokyo Singing (2020) featuring a collaboration with Amy Lee of Evanescence. As of the end of 2024, the band has gone on indefinite hiatus.
Even if you, like me, don’t know much about J-rock/J-pop, if you have an interest in folk rock/metal (and love/miss[1] key changes!), this is a really fun band to check out.
Happy listening!
- Here’s a fun Tedium article that was referenced in a toot I saw recently, exploring the demise of the key change in pop music over the last 60 years: “The Death of the Key Change” by Chris Dalla Riva (Nov 9, 2022). The article looks specifically at pop music that hit the Billboard Hot 100 charts so I can’t help but wonder now if the key change is still alive and well in J-pop. Anyone know? ↩︎
#CrowxClass #folkMetal #folkRock #Hanafugetsu #JPop #JRock #music #musicDiscovery #Shigin #SuzuhanaYuko #WagakkiBand
-
Drugs of Faith – Asymmetrical Review
By El Cuervo
Though the group may have swerved any attention at AngryMetalGuy.com, and swerved a full-length album for more than 13 years, Virginia’s Drugs of Faith have no shortage of grindcore pedigree. Besides a smorgasbord of demos, EPs, splits, and singles, Richard Johnson of Agoraphobic Nosebleed notoriety graces the band with guitar and vocals. Asymmetrical is their latest release and promises an uneven spread of musical directions and lyrical themes on a base built on punky, noisy grind. Does it deliver?
It certainly delivers on noise. The word “chaos” (or its derivatives) appeared no fewer than seven times in my notes describing these ten tracks. Intensity and off-kilter energy are splattered all over Asymmetrical, but there are particular moments that stand out. I particularly enjoy the lead over the first half of “Drones”; it blends a chromatic melody with trilling flourishes, expressed through tumultuous, tremolo-picked guitars. Likewise, the discordance over the first half of “Divestment” builds an unsettling wall of noise. Layered on top are vocals that lever the sneering edge of punk and the super-charged energy of hardcore. It coalesces into just 21 minutes of speedy, energetic grindcore designed to spark you out of your everyday tedium. Its lo-fi, roughshod style strikes quickly and strikes hard.
Distinguishing the Drugs of Faith sound slightly are the drums and bass that sit further forward in the mix than the guitars which sit relatively far back. The purring bass is a standout, commanding the songs’ progression with a pleasingly-grounded rumble. Despite this advantage, and the reasonably-unique production caused by the mix, setting the guitars back means the riffs – that typically switch between stomping grooves and sawing swings – don’t have as much clout as they should. This dilutes one of the key components of Asymmetrical’s memorability. The grinding guitars in the middle of the mix contribute to the general cacophony and chaos but ultimately make the music more forgettable. By way of comparison, the opening lead on “Gas Mask” is surprisingly crunchy and differentiates itself because the bass guitar isn’t there to cover everything in its distortion. I enjoy the album’s overall aesthetic but the moments where the guitars are exposed allow them to have more impact.
Because of the mix that blunts its songs’ riffs, Asymmetrical begins to blur across its side A. Side B attempts to refresh the album’s sound, but isn’t able to quite do enough. I’ve already described the crunchy opening on “Gas Mask”, but the frenzied guitar solo on “The Void” does its part too. Again, prioritizing the guitar does some good for the song’s memorability and contributes to the insanity. Similarly, “The Next 100 Years” uses a cleaner guitar transition between passages, and there are call-and-response shouts on “Essential.” Each of these is just a small part of their respective tracks but they offer new textures on an album that doesn’t care too much for musical variety. While a band like Beaten to Death offers utterly atypical grindcore, one of the things I love about them is how their core sound expands with fragments of other genres. This confers variety and hooks. Asymmetrical is briefer but also more homogenous than most, meaning its impact through brevity is diluted.
Drugs of Faith won’t change your life through musical innovation, mind-blowing melodies, or relentless variety. But it’s just about entertaining enough for existing grind aficionados seeking 20 minutes of catharsis. The interesting production and weaponized chaos give Asymmetrical a sharp edge. However, I doubt that it will be entertaining enough for those who aren’t already on the grind bandwagon because the riffs don’t have the power I want them to.
Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps MP3
Label: Selfmadegod Records
Websites: facebook.com/drugsoffaith | drugsoffaith.bandcamp.com
Releases worldwide: February 21st, 2025#25 #2025 #AgoraphobicNosebleed #AmericanMetal #Asymmetrical #BeatenToDeath #DrugsOfFaith #Feb25 #Grindcore #Review #Reviews
-
Drugs of Faith – Asymmetrical Review
By El Cuervo
Though the group may have swerved any attention at AngryMetalGuy.com, and swerved a full-length album for more than 13 years, Virginia’s Drugs of Faith have no shortage of grindcore pedigree. Besides a smorgasbord of demos, EPs, splits, and singles, Richard Johnson of Agoraphobic Nosebleed notoriety graces the band with guitar and vocals. Asymmetrical is their latest release and promises an uneven spread of musical directions and lyrical themes on a base built on punky, noisy grind. Does it deliver?
It certainly delivers on noise. The word “chaos” (or its derivatives) appeared no fewer than seven times in my notes describing these ten tracks. Intensity and off-kilter energy are splattered all over Asymmetrical, but there are particular moments that stand out. I particularly enjoy the lead over the first half of “Drones”; it blends a chromatic melody with trilling flourishes, expressed through tumultuous, tremolo-picked guitars. Likewise, the discordance over the first half of “Divestment” builds an unsettling wall of noise. Layered on top are vocals that lever the sneering edge of punk and the super-charged energy of hardcore. It coalesces into just 21 minutes of speedy, energetic grindcore designed to spark you out of your everyday tedium. Its lo-fi, roughshod style strikes quickly and strikes hard.
Distinguishing the Drugs of Faith sound slightly are the drums and bass that sit further forward in the mix than the guitars which sit relatively far back. The purring bass is a standout, commanding the songs’ progression with a pleasingly-grounded rumble. Despite this advantage, and the reasonably-unique production caused by the mix, setting the guitars back means the riffs – that typically switch between stomping grooves and sawing swings – don’t have as much clout as they should. This dilutes one of the key components of Asymmetrical’s memorability. The grinding guitars in the middle of the mix contribute to the general cacophony and chaos but ultimately make the music more forgettable. By way of comparison, the opening lead on “Gas Mask” is surprisingly crunchy and differentiates itself because the bass guitar isn’t there to cover everything in its distortion. I enjoy the album’s overall aesthetic but the moments where the guitars are exposed allow them to have more impact.
Because of the mix that blunts its songs’ riffs, Asymmetrical begins to blur across its side A. Side B attempts to refresh the album’s sound, but isn’t able to quite do enough. I’ve already described the crunchy opening on “Gas Mask”, but the frenzied guitar solo on “The Void” does its part too. Again, prioritizing the guitar does some good for the song’s memorability and contributes to the insanity. Similarly, “The Next 100 Years” uses a cleaner guitar transition between passages, and there are call-and-response shouts on “Essential.” Each of these is just a small part of their respective tracks but they offer new textures on an album that doesn’t care too much for musical variety. While a band like Beaten to Death offers utterly atypical grindcore, one of the things I love about them is how their core sound expands with fragments of other genres. This confers variety and hooks. Asymmetrical is briefer but also more homogenous than most, meaning its impact through brevity is diluted.
Drugs of Faith won’t change your life through musical innovation, mind-blowing melodies, or relentless variety. But it’s just about entertaining enough for existing grind aficionados seeking 20 minutes of catharsis. The interesting production and weaponized chaos give Asymmetrical a sharp edge. However, I doubt that it will be entertaining enough for those who aren’t already on the grind bandwagon because the riffs don’t have the power I want them to.
Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps MP3
Label: Selfmadegod Records
Websites: facebook.com/drugsoffaith | drugsoffaith.bandcamp.com
Releases worldwide: February 21st, 2025#25 #2025 #AgoraphobicNosebleed #AmericanMetal #Asymmetrical #BeatenToDeath #DrugsOfFaith #Feb25 #Grindcore #Review #Reviews
-
Drugs of Faith – Asymmetrical Review
By El Cuervo
Though the group may have swerved any attention at AngryMetalGuy.com, and swerved a full-length album for more than 13 years, Virginia’s Drugs of Faith have no shortage of grindcore pedigree. Besides a smorgasbord of demos, EPs, splits, and singles, Richard Johnson of Agoraphobic Nosebleed notoriety graces the band with guitar and vocals. Asymmetrical is their latest release and promises an uneven spread of musical directions and lyrical themes on a base built on punky, noisy grind. Does it deliver?
It certainly delivers on noise. The word “chaos” (or its derivatives) appeared no fewer than seven times in my notes describing these ten tracks. Intensity and off-kilter energy are splattered all over Asymmetrical, but there are particular moments that stand out. I particularly enjoy the lead over the first half of “Drones”; it blends a chromatic melody with trilling flourishes, expressed through tumultuous, tremolo-picked guitars. Likewise, the discordance over the first half of “Divestment” builds an unsettling wall of noise. Layered on top are vocals that lever the sneering edge of punk and the super-charged energy of hardcore. It coalesces into just 21 minutes of speedy, energetic grindcore designed to spark you out of your everyday tedium. Its lo-fi, roughshod style strikes quickly and strikes hard.
Distinguishing the Drugs of Faith sound slightly are the drums and bass that sit further forward in the mix than the guitars which sit relatively far back. The purring bass is a standout, commanding the songs’ progression with a pleasingly-grounded rumble. Despite this advantage, and the reasonably-unique production caused by the mix, setting the guitars back means the riffs – that typically switch between stomping grooves and sawing swings – don’t have as much clout as they should. This dilutes one of the key components of Asymmetrical’s memorability. The grinding guitars in the middle of the mix contribute to the general cacophony and chaos but ultimately make the music more forgettable. By way of comparison, the opening lead on “Gas Mask” is surprisingly crunchy and differentiates itself because the bass guitar isn’t there to cover everything in its distortion. I enjoy the album’s overall aesthetic but the moments where the guitars are exposed allow them to have more impact.
Because of the mix that blunts its songs’ riffs, Asymmetrical begins to blur across its side A. Side B attempts to refresh the album’s sound, but isn’t able to quite do enough. I’ve already described the crunchy opening on “Gas Mask”, but the frenzied guitar solo on “The Void” does its part too. Again, prioritizing the guitar does some good for the song’s memorability and contributes to the insanity. Similarly, “The Next 100 Years” uses a cleaner guitar transition between passages, and there are call-and-response shouts on “Essential.” Each of these is just a small part of their respective tracks but they offer new textures on an album that doesn’t care too much for musical variety. While a band like Beaten to Death offers utterly atypical grindcore, one of the things I love about them is how their core sound expands with fragments of other genres. This confers variety and hooks. Asymmetrical is briefer but also more homogenous than most, meaning its impact through brevity is diluted.
Drugs of Faith won’t change your life through musical innovation, mind-blowing melodies, or relentless variety. But it’s just about entertaining enough for existing grind aficionados seeking 20 minutes of catharsis. The interesting production and weaponized chaos give Asymmetrical a sharp edge. However, I doubt that it will be entertaining enough for those who aren’t already on the grind bandwagon because the riffs don’t have the power I want them to.
Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps MP3
Label: Selfmadegod Records
Websites: facebook.com/drugsoffaith | drugsoffaith.bandcamp.com
Releases worldwide: February 21st, 2025#25 #2025 #AgoraphobicNosebleed #AmericanMetal #Asymmetrical #BeatenToDeath #DrugsOfFaith #Feb25 #Grindcore #Review #Reviews
-
Drugs of Faith – Asymmetrical Review
By El Cuervo
Though the group may have swerved any attention at AngryMetalGuy.com, and swerved a full-length album for more than 13 years, Virginia’s Drugs of Faith have no shortage of grindcore pedigree. Besides a smorgasbord of demos, EPs, splits, and singles, Richard Johnson of Agoraphobic Nosebleed notoriety graces the band with guitar and vocals. Asymmetrical is their latest release and promises an uneven spread of musical directions and lyrical themes on a base built on punky, noisy grind. Does it deliver?
It certainly delivers on noise. The word “chaos” (or its derivatives) appeared no fewer than seven times in my notes describing these ten tracks. Intensity and off-kilter energy are splattered all over Asymmetrical, but there are particular moments that stand out. I particularly enjoy the lead over the first half of “Drones”; it blends a chromatic melody with trilling flourishes, expressed through tumultuous, tremolo-picked guitars. Likewise, the discordance over the first half of “Divestment” builds an unsettling wall of noise. Layered on top are vocals that lever the sneering edge of punk and the super-charged energy of hardcore. It coalesces into just 21 minutes of speedy, energetic grindcore designed to spark you out of your everyday tedium. Its lo-fi, roughshod style strikes quickly and strikes hard.
Distinguishing the Drugs of Faith sound slightly are the drums and bass that sit further forward in the mix than the guitars which sit relatively far back. The purring bass is a standout, commanding the songs’ progression with a pleasingly-grounded rumble. Despite this advantage, and the reasonably-unique production caused by the mix, setting the guitars back means the riffs – that typically switch between stomping grooves and sawing swings – don’t have as much clout as they should. This dilutes one of the key components of Asymmetrical’s memorability. The grinding guitars in the middle of the mix contribute to the general cacophony and chaos but ultimately make the music more forgettable. By way of comparison, the opening lead on “Gas Mask” is surprisingly crunchy and differentiates itself because the bass guitar isn’t there to cover everything in its distortion. I enjoy the album’s overall aesthetic but the moments where the guitars are exposed allow them to have more impact.
Because of the mix that blunts its songs’ riffs, Asymmetrical begins to blur across its side A. Side B attempts to refresh the album’s sound, but isn’t able to quite do enough. I’ve already described the crunchy opening on “Gas Mask”, but the frenzied guitar solo on “The Void” does its part too. Again, prioritizing the guitar does some good for the song’s memorability and contributes to the insanity. Similarly, “The Next 100 Years” uses a cleaner guitar transition between passages, and there are call-and-response shouts on “Essential.” Each of these is just a small part of their respective tracks but they offer new textures on an album that doesn’t care too much for musical variety. While a band like Beaten to Death offers utterly atypical grindcore, one of the things I love about them is how their core sound expands with fragments of other genres. This confers variety and hooks. Asymmetrical is briefer but also more homogenous than most, meaning its impact through brevity is diluted.
Drugs of Faith won’t change your life through musical innovation, mind-blowing melodies, or relentless variety. But it’s just about entertaining enough for existing grind aficionados seeking 20 minutes of catharsis. The interesting production and weaponized chaos give Asymmetrical a sharp edge. However, I doubt that it will be entertaining enough for those who aren’t already on the grind bandwagon because the riffs don’t have the power I want them to.
Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps MP3
Label: Selfmadegod Records
Websites: facebook.com/drugsoffaith | drugsoffaith.bandcamp.com
Releases worldwide: February 21st, 2025#25 #2025 #AgoraphobicNosebleed #AmericanMetal #Asymmetrical #BeatenToDeath #DrugsOfFaith #Feb25 #Grindcore #Review #Reviews
-
AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö: Sunnata – Chasing Shadows
By Dolphin Whisperer
“AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö” is a time-honored tradition to showcase the most underground of the underground—the unsigned and unpromoted. This collective review treatment continues to exist to unite our writers in boot or bolster of the bands who remind us that, for better or worse, the metal underground exists as an important part of the global metal scene. The Rodeö rides on.”
Does Poland evoke the heated and stinging breeze of the open desert to a lost mind? No? Sunnata likes to think otherwise, or at least it’s their life’s mission to expand on the ideas of exotic scales, eerie harmonization, and chanting repetitiveness to match the power of shifting sands in their homeland. Back in 2021, our very own Cherd had a tough time coming to terms with what these Eastern bloc mystics conjured on Burning in Heaven, Melting on Earth. But now a few years wiser, ever iterating,1 and pursuant of their own self-produced visions, can Sunnata sway both our grumpy grandpa Cherd and his crack rodeo crew with Chasing Shadows? – Dolphin Whisperer
Sunnata // Chasing Shadows [May 10th, 2024]
Cherd: I wasn’t terribly keen on Sunnata’s 2021 record Burning in Heaven, Melting on Earth, so I passed on reviewing their follow-up when it landed in the promo sump. Then Dolph decided to go and write a whole damn Rodeö about Chasing Shadows, so I figured I’d better give my two cents after all. Chasing Shadows is a definite step up, thanks to the heavy dose of 90s grunge these Poles have injected into their psych/stoner doom. I’m sure you’ll be sick of reading the name Alice In Chains by the end of this article, but good god do the vocal harmonies call them to mind. The strongest tracks, like “Torn” and “Saviour’s Raft” rely heavily on these. Meanwhile, when the band leans into their “exotic” side—vaguely Middle Eastern motifs—as they do on “Wishbone” and “The Tide,” the songs drag. There’s fat to trim across the album’s 60+ minutes, especially the throwaway closing quasi-dance track. That said, the eight-minute “Hunger” earns its entire runtime with a hypnotic tempo and the record’s best build up. There’s a lot to like in Chasing Shadows, even if there is some bloat. 3.0/5.0
Maddog: Sunnata’s Chasing Shadows is an hour of shameless psychedelia. Take Dvne riffs, add a pinch of Mayhem in Blue-era Hail Spirit Noir, and pour a bucket of fuzzy stoned melodies on top, and you get the gist. This recipe is a blessing and a curse. Chasing Shadows’ most well-formed pieces hit hard. When Sunnata focuses on developing melodies, they hold me transfixed, like on album highlight “Torn.” When Sunnata focuses on buildups, they whisk me out of the world and onto a dramatic ride (“Chimera”). When Sunnata focuses on rhythmic sections that hypnotize the listener, they conjure a beautiful soundscape, like the primordial chorus of “Hunger.” When Sunnata focuses on rock-solid bass lines, they add power and depth to their atmosphere (“Adrift”). But sometimes, Sunnata focuses on nothing. Even the strongest cuts overstay their welcome with meandering fuzz. As the album progresses, some full tracks get swallowed by tedium, and the moaned vocals become grating; neither undivided attention nor psilocybin can save songs like “The Sleeper” from fading into the background.2—Still, Sunnata has a talent for writing sludgy psychedelic passages that stand out from their peers. If they can trim some low-hanging fat and focus on their strengths, their next record could be a gem. 2.5/5.0
Dolphin Whisperer: Chasing Shadows seems to know exactly what it is—a dry, desert-wandering, bass-heavy affair that leans into psychedelia via shifting repetitions. And Sunnata seem to have figured out exactly how they want to explore this meditation—heavy and dark Alice in Chains vocal melodies, twangy stoner guitar refrains, and song drives that creep ever faster into their snaking swirl. Though, throughout this dusty adventure, guitar passages resemble less of the easy-to-digest percussive draws of a band like Kyuss and more of the modal and trilling explorations of similar sounds that you’d hear in an occult act like Sabbath Assembly. (“Chimera,” “Wishbone”). And on longer cuts, at least before Sunnata achieves maximum throttle, doom inflections, fat bass rumbling, and laser-pointing drone that bubbles and bakes and broils the experimental madhouse of Obake. But most importantly, as a fever dream like this sound, Chasing Shadows maintains a warping yet consistent tonality that slowly and sneakily lures as the rattle of a hissing pit viper to a lost and dazed traveler. It does, however, require a hefty dose of patience and practice to maintain a footing the whole way through its hour-long trial, its various interludes and strange darkwave closing adding little. To curious ears, though, Chasing Shadows will be an easy listen, despite its limited bag of tricks and hefty presence, and those who buy in fully to its tonal landscape may find even more rewards. 3.0/5.0
Itchymenace: Chasing Shadows reminds me of the Albert Camus story, The Adulterous Woman. In fact, the cover art seems plucked directly from the final scene in which the protagonist runs out into the Algerian desert a changed woman after realizing life with her husband will never fulfill her. The music provides the perfect soundtrack for the existential metamorphosis she goes through, or that anyone might go through when they peel back the delicate layers of life and search for deeper meaning. I did not expect to like this as much as I do, but Sunnata has created a masterpiece. This album drags you across a jagged desert landscape and drenches you in rich, dreamlike musical passages that leave you questioning your very existence. The music is complex, varied, heavy and meditative. The arrangements are deceptively simple to make the journey seem easy—until you realize you’re not in Kansas anymore. Especially noteworthy is how the bass guitar drives the compositions. Bassist Michal Dobrzanski’s tone is massive but somehow leaves plenty of room in the soundscape for Szymon Ewertowski and Adrian Gadomski’s intricate guitars and vocals. Drummer Robert Ruszczyk keeps a ritualistic tempo that seamlessly moves the caravan forward through the heart of darkness. If I were to try to describe this to a metalhead, I’d say imagine Alice in Chains trying to play Gorguts by way of Earth. Brilliant! Original! Frightening! And a new experience with every listen. 4.5/5.03
Mystikus Hugebeard: True to Sunnata’s desert prog premise, Chasing Shadows is a mirage: captivating, frustrating, and an incomplete vision of something spectacular. At sixty-two minutes long, the length will likely prove to be as controversial as it is intentional; repetition is key to Sunnata’s songwriting, as it weaves a surreal soundscape through thick, drawn-out riffs. Sometimes, it’s entrancing. Other times, I’m just bored. The more evolutionary tracks are where Chasing Shadows come to life. The off-key vocal layers and thick, fuzzy guitars are in “Chimera” and “Saviour’s Raft” take their time to progress into explosive riffs that feel earned by the buildup. Even a less progressive track like “Torn” works just by nature of how palpable the desert atmosphere is, with the chugging bass, elusive guitar lines, and hallucinatory vocals hypnotizing the listener. “Hunger” and “The Sleeper” also have a satisfying chug to them but feel emptier, with resolutions that are satisfying in the moment but still less memorable than those from earlier tracks. The worst offenders, “Wishbone” and “The Tide,” are almost completely aimless and are fully devoid of the strong atmospheric qualities that makes the rest work. The emulation of an endless trek through an endless desert is uncanny, and the aimlessness can work when paired with hypnotic songwriting like in “Torn,” but overall the lack of a meaningful destination or payoff within the already less engaging tracks only gets worse as the album drags on, and it slowly begins to drown out the parts that work well. I really love the thematic intent behind Chasing Shadows, which only makes the final result all the more frustrating that it falls short of being a truly great desert odyssey. 2.5/5.0
#2024 #AliceInChains #AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo #AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo2024 #ChasingShadows #DoomMetal #Dvne #Earth #HailSpiritNoir #IndependentRelease #Kyuss #Obake #OccultRock #PolishMetal #PostMetal #PsychedelicDoomMetal #PsychedelicRock #SabbathAssembly #SelfRelease #StonerRock #Sunnata
-
AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö: Sunnata – Chasing Shadows
By Dolphin Whisperer
“AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö” is a time-honored tradition to showcase the most underground of the underground—the unsigned and unpromoted. This collective review treatment continues to exist to unite our writers in boot or bolster of the bands who remind us that, for better or worse, the metal underground exists as an important part of the global metal scene. The Rodeö rides on.”
Does Poland evoke the heated and stinging breeze of the open desert to a lost mind? No? Sunnata likes to think otherwise, or at least it’s their life’s mission to expand on the ideas of exotic scales, eerie harmonization, and chanting repetitiveness to match the power of shifting sands in their homeland. Back in 2021, our very own Cherd had a tough time coming to terms with what these Eastern bloc mystics conjured on Burning in Heaven, Melting on Earth. But now a few years wiser, ever iterating,1 and pursuant of their own self-produced visions, can Sunnata sway both our grumpy grandpa Cherd and his crack rodeo crew with Chasing Shadows? – Dolphin Whisperer
Sunnata // Chasing Shadows [May 10th, 2024]
Cherd: I wasn’t terribly keen on Sunnata’s 2021 record Burning in Heaven, Melting on Earth, so I passed on reviewing their follow-up when it landed in the promo sump. Then Dolph decided to go and write a whole damn Rodeö about Chasing Shadows, so I figured I’d better give my two cents after all. Chasing Shadows is a definite step up, thanks to the heavy dose of 90s grunge these Poles have injected into their psych/stoner doom. I’m sure you’ll be sick of reading the name Alice In Chains by the end of this article, but good god do the vocal harmonies call them to mind. The strongest tracks, like “Torn” and “Saviour’s Raft” rely heavily on these. Meanwhile, when the band leans into their “exotic” side—vaguely Middle Eastern motifs—as they do on “Wishbone” and “The Tide,” the songs drag. There’s fat to trim across the album’s 60+ minutes, especially the throwaway closing quasi-dance track. That said, the eight-minute “Hunger” earns its entire runtime with a hypnotic tempo and the record’s best build up. There’s a lot to like in Chasing Shadows, even if there is some bloat. 3.0/5.0
Maddog: Sunnata’s Chasing Shadows is an hour of shameless psychedelia. Take Dvne riffs, add a pinch of Mayhem in Blue-era Hail Spirit Noir, and pour a bucket of fuzzy stoned melodies on top, and you get the gist. This recipe is a blessing and a curse. Chasing Shadows’ most well-formed pieces hit hard. When Sunnata focuses on developing melodies, they hold me transfixed, like on album highlight “Torn.” When Sunnata focuses on buildups, they whisk me out of the world and onto a dramatic ride (“Chimera”). When Sunnata focuses on rhythmic sections that hypnotize the listener, they conjure a beautiful soundscape, like the primordial chorus of “Hunger.” When Sunnata focuses on rock-solid bass lines, they add power and depth to their atmosphere (“Adrift”). But sometimes, Sunnata focuses on nothing. Even the strongest cuts overstay their welcome with meandering fuzz. As the album progresses, some full tracks get swallowed by tedium, and the moaned vocals become grating; neither undivided attention nor psilocybin can save songs like “The Sleeper” from fading into the background.2—Still, Sunnata has a talent for writing sludgy psychedelic passages that stand out from their peers. If they can trim some low-hanging fat and focus on their strengths, their next record could be a gem. 2.5/5.0
Dolphin Whisperer: Chasing Shadows seems to know exactly what it is—a dry, desert-wandering, bass-heavy affair that leans into psychedelia via shifting repetitions. And Sunnata seem to have figured out exactly how they want to explore this meditation—heavy and dark Alice in Chains vocal melodies, twangy stoner guitar refrains, and song drives that creep ever faster into their snaking swirl. Though, throughout this dusty adventure, guitar passages resemble less of the easy-to-digest percussive draws of a band like Kyuss and more of the modal and trilling explorations of similar sounds that you’d hear in an occult act like Sabbath Assembly. (“Chimera,” “Wishbone”). And on longer cuts, at least before Sunnata achieves maximum throttle, doom inflections, fat bass rumbling, and laser-pointing drone that bubbles and bakes and broils the experimental madhouse of Obake. But most importantly, as a fever dream like this sound, Chasing Shadows maintains a warping yet consistent tonality that slowly and sneakily lures as the rattle of a hissing pit viper to a lost and dazed traveler. It does, however, require a hefty dose of patience and practice to maintain a footing the whole way through its hour-long trial, its various interludes and strange darkwave closing adding little. To curious ears, though, Chasing Shadows will be an easy listen, despite its limited bag of tricks and hefty presence, and those who buy in fully to its tonal landscape may find even more rewards. 3.0/5.0
Itchymenace: Chasing Shadows reminds me of the Albert Camus story, The Adulterous Woman. In fact, the cover art seems plucked directly from the final scene in which the protagonist runs out into the Algerian desert a changed woman after realizing life with her husband will never fulfill her. The music provides the perfect soundtrack for the existential metamorphosis she goes through, or that anyone might go through when they peel back the delicate layers of life and search for deeper meaning. I did not expect to like this as much as I do, but Sunnata has created a masterpiece. This album drags you across a jagged desert landscape and drenches you in rich, dreamlike musical passages that leave you questioning your very existence. The music is complex, varied, heavy and meditative. The arrangements are deceptively simple to make the journey seem easy—until you realize you’re not in Kansas anymore. Especially noteworthy is how the bass guitar drives the compositions. Bassist Michal Dobrzanski’s tone is massive but somehow leaves plenty of room in the soundscape for Szymon Ewertowski and Adrian Gadomski’s intricate guitars and vocals. Drummer Robert Ruszczyk keeps a ritualistic tempo that seamlessly moves the caravan forward through the heart of darkness. If I were to try to describe this to a metalhead, I’d say imagine Alice in Chains trying to play Gorguts by way of Earth. Brilliant! Original! Frightening! And a new experience with every listen. 4.5/5.03
Mystikus Hugebeard: True to Sunnata’s desert prog premise, Chasing Shadows is a mirage: captivating, frustrating, and an incomplete vision of something spectacular. At sixty-two minutes long, the length will likely prove to be as controversial as it is intentional; repetition is key to Sunnata’s songwriting, as it weaves a surreal soundscape through thick, drawn-out riffs. Sometimes, it’s entrancing. Other times, I’m just bored. The more evolutionary tracks are where Chasing Shadows come to life. The off-key vocal layers and thick, fuzzy guitars are in “Chimera” and “Saviour’s Raft” take their time to progress into explosive riffs that feel earned by the buildup. Even a less progressive track like “Torn” works just by nature of how palpable the desert atmosphere is, with the chugging bass, elusive guitar lines, and hallucinatory vocals hypnotizing the listener. “Hunger” and “The Sleeper” also have a satisfying chug to them but feel emptier, with resolutions that are satisfying in the moment but still less memorable than those from earlier tracks. The worst offenders, “Wishbone” and “The Tide,” are almost completely aimless and are fully devoid of the strong atmospheric qualities that makes the rest work. The emulation of an endless trek through an endless desert is uncanny, and the aimlessness can work when paired with hypnotic songwriting like in “Torn,” but overall the lack of a meaningful destination or payoff within the already less engaging tracks only gets worse as the album drags on, and it slowly begins to drown out the parts that work well. I really love the thematic intent behind Chasing Shadows, which only makes the final result all the more frustrating that it falls short of being a truly great desert odyssey. 2.5/5.0
#2024 #AliceInChains #AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo #AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo2024 #ChasingShadows #DoomMetal #Dvne #Earth #HailSpiritNoir #IndependentRelease #Kyuss #Obake #OccultRock #PolishMetal #PostMetal #PsychedelicDoomMetal #PsychedelicRock #SabbathAssembly #SelfRelease #StonerRock #Sunnata
-
Secret Rule – Uninverse Review
By GardensTale
Well folks, it’s been a good run. This is without a doubt the longest I have gone without landing myself an awful corset-core album. I cherry-picked from the promo bin a little more, I got lucky with a few random rolls. But the dice always turn against you sometime, as any D&D player will attest. I knew I was in trouble when I saw the genre and the worst band name since Significant Point. Then I saw the cover and my fears were confirmed because LOOK AT IT! Gaze upon this absolute debacle and weep for laughter. No amount of Photoshop skill could have saved the ludicrous self-serious poses the band assumed here, and indeed, no amount of Photoshop skill was applied. Meanwhile, the promo text confidently declared Uninverse1 a masterpiece of emotional connection to the human experience. My expectations were below the floorboards before the first note started, so can Secret Rule prove me wrong?
Initially, I did not think so. The electronic beat that kicks off “Disorder” and the hushed repeated ‘you’re eeeeevil, you’re eeeeevil’ reactivated my funny bone within seconds. As is tradition in corset-core, the music comes second to the vocals, which in this case belong to one Angela Di Vincenzo. To be fair, her technique is not terrible. She has good power, and in the lower registers, her timbre has a Doro Pesch-like quality. She doesn’t hit all the notes, which is worrying on a studio recording, but I’ve certainly heard worse. However, her performance is stuffed with squealy pop affectations, presumably intended to emulate emotional engagement. With a voice that already tends towards the shrill in the higher registers, the squeaks make for an uncomfortable listening experience as I find myself wincing every other sentence. Combined with equally overused and forced vibrato and unfortunate amounts of ESL,2 the vocals overflow with pop excess that only becomes more off-putting the longer Uninverse plays.
But looking past the vocals and peeking under the hood, the songwriting is often surprisingly able. The focus is on the choruses, as expected, and across the album, those contain some strong vocal lines, which even Di Vincenzo’s over-singing can’t hide. Furthermore, beside the choruses, actual riffs dot the album, such as on “Time Zero” and “Gravity on Us.” The quality drum performance eschews the tedium of the standard snare-kick 4-count, adding fills and frills for a more dynamic style that brings actual variations in energy. Though the bass gets buried more often than not, a few passages allow it to shine. If it weren’t for most of the surface bullshit, a few excisions could have made this a passing power metal album.
But like a half-decent cake covered with a mountain of fondant, the surface bullshit ruins everything underneath. The vocals are only one symptom of this affliction. Several tracks give a leading role to the keyboard, and the keyboard is fucking garbage, an icepick assault to both eardrums even in short bursts. It is the leading cause of death of “Disorder”3 and has me afeared every time I see “I Am” or “From Null to Life” coming up in the tracklist. Between the keys, the pop-focus of the vocals, the clumps of electronic beats, and the flat, vocal-centered production all point to a band trying too hard to sound ‘modern’ and aging itself back to the cringiest leftovers of the 00’s.
I know you and I love a good takedown now and then. Hell, it was practically My Thing for a while here at AMG. Based on the cover art and the first track, Secret Rule seemed ripe for the plucking. But I couldn’t fully commit to the bash-fest here, because unpleasant though Uninverse might be, there is a modicum of talent hidden in the background that spills out through the cracks, which makes the end result more a tragedy than a comedy. Were this a younger band, I might express hope for their improvement in the future. But this is Secret Rule’s 8th proper album4 in 9 years. Hope is dead and the keyboards killed it. At least the band photos are a laugh.
Rating: 1.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 256 kbps mp3
Label: Lucky Bob
Websites: secretrule.bandcamp.com | secretrule.it | facebook.com/secretruleband
Releases Worldwide: November 24th, 2023#15 #2023 #Doro #ItalianMetal #LuckyBob #Nov23 #PowerMetal #Review #Reviews #SecretRule #SignificantPoint #SymphonicMetal #Uninverse
-
Secret Rule – Uninverse Review
By GardensTale
Well folks, it’s been a good run. This is without a doubt the longest I have gone without landing myself an awful corset-core album. I cherry-picked from the promo bin a little more, I got lucky with a few random rolls. But the dice always turn against you sometime, as any D&D player will attest. I knew I was in trouble when I saw the genre and the worst band name since Significant Point. Then I saw the cover and my fears were confirmed because LOOK AT IT! Gaze upon this absolute debacle and weep for laughter. No amount of Photoshop skill could have saved the ludicrous self-serious poses the band assumed here, and indeed, no amount of Photoshop skill was applied. Meanwhile, the promo text confidently declared Uninverse1 a masterpiece of emotional connection to the human experience. My expectations were below the floorboards before the first note started, so can Secret Rule prove me wrong?
Initially, I did not think so. The electronic beat that kicks off “Disorder” and the hushed repeated ‘you’re eeeeevil, you’re eeeeevil’ reactivated my funny bone within seconds. As is tradition in corset-core, the music comes second to the vocals, which in this case belong to one Angela Di Vincenzo. To be fair, her technique is not terrible. She has good power, and in the lower registers, her timbre has a Doro Pesch-like quality. She doesn’t hit all the notes, which is worrying on a studio recording, but I’ve certainly heard worse. However, her performance is stuffed with squealy pop affectations, presumably intended to emulate emotional engagement. With a voice that already tends towards the shrill in the higher registers, the squeaks make for an uncomfortable listening experience as I find myself wincing every other sentence. Combined with equally overused and forced vibrato and unfortunate amounts of ESL,2 the vocals overflow with pop excess that only becomes more off-putting the longer Uninverse plays.
But looking past the vocals and peeking under the hood, the songwriting is often surprisingly able. The focus is on the choruses, as expected, and across the album, those contain some strong vocal lines, which even Di Vincenzo’s over-singing can’t hide. Furthermore, beside the choruses, actual riffs dot the album, such as on “Time Zero” and “Gravity on Us.” The quality drum performance eschews the tedium of the standard snare-kick 4-count, adding fills and frills for a more dynamic style that brings actual variations in energy. Though the bass gets buried more often than not, a few passages allow it to shine. If it weren’t for most of the surface bullshit, a few excisions could have made this a passing power metal album.
But like a half-decent cake covered with a mountain of fondant, the surface bullshit ruins everything underneath. The vocals are only one symptom of this affliction. Several tracks give a leading role to the keyboard, and the keyboard is fucking garbage, an icepick assault to both eardrums even in short bursts. It is the leading cause of death of “Disorder”3 and has me afeared every time I see “I Am” or “From Null to Life” coming up in the tracklist. Between the keys, the pop-focus of the vocals, the clumps of electronic beats, and the flat, vocal-centered production all point to a band trying too hard to sound ‘modern’ and aging itself back to the cringiest leftovers of the 00’s.
I know you and I love a good takedown now and then. Hell, it was practically My Thing for a while here at AMG. Based on the cover art and the first track, Secret Rule seemed ripe for the plucking. But I couldn’t fully commit to the bash-fest here, because unpleasant though Uninverse might be, there is a modicum of talent hidden in the background that spills out through the cracks, which makes the end result more a tragedy than a comedy. Were this a younger band, I might express hope for their improvement in the future. But this is Secret Rule’s 8th proper album4 in 9 years. Hope is dead and the keyboards killed it. At least the band photos are a laugh.
Rating: 1.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 256 kbps mp3
Label: Lucky Bob
Websites: secretrule.bandcamp.com | secretrule.it | facebook.com/secretruleband
Releases Worldwide: November 24th, 2023#15 #2023 #Doro #ItalianMetal #LuckyBob #Nov23 #PowerMetal #Review #Reviews #SecretRule #SignificantPoint #SymphonicMetal #Uninverse
-
CW: extended thoughts about searchability on the fediverse
Meme I quickly made about responses to the ongoing discussion about #searchability on the #fediverse. As a #contentCreator and #activist for #toplessEquality--which gets me banned repeatedly on all mainstream platforms even when I DO censor out my heinous female nipples (see https://www.toplesstopics.org/banned for receipts!), a primary motivator for me to use platforms like #mastodon is to be able to spread the word about #GenderEquality anti- #censorship among more potential supporters. But the lack of #searchability on Masto makes this very hard. I'm dependent on existing followers to boost my posts so others following -them- can see it, etc, but for whatever reason very few of my existing followers do. I also can't really find posts by other people outside of my instance and the people I'm following--like I've never seen another post about #vidcon besides my own, so I have no idea if anyone else on the fediverse is even messaging about it.
#Consent is of course a cornerstone of the fediverse experience, including someone consenting to whether or not they want a certain kind of content to pop up in their feeds. And having #contentWarnings and #altText encouraged if not required by most instances makes this place leagues more of a safe space for marginalized and/or traumatized people in a way that they cannot experience on mainstream platforms. But this can be very time-consuming and cumbersome, both remembering to add CWs and Alt Text to everything, coming up with custom text every time, and also on the end of it--when you follow enough people (or check out the public timelines) pressing "show content" over and over and over on each post gets REALLY annoying. But again, I'd rather have that tedium then have to subject myself to content that I find really triggering (for me, it's pretty much anything to do with kids and #gunViolence...I live in America where my kids are at risk of getting shot every day they go to school, and while I want to stay informed, I also need some mental prep before I look/read too much about it). And I know for others who have even more triggers, especially around things that the majority of people wouldn't find triggering (like pictures of food), then again, the fediverse is leagues better than the "normal" sites.
But back to searchability, as a veteran Twitter user (I cold-turkey quit in November, don't worry) I am well versed in how dealing with reactionary bullies who can take a tweet out of context and share it with their thousands if not millions of followers to dunk on you all at once. It can also open you up to a lot of haters in general, who will search out content like yours to leave hateful comments (like the comment sections of my Tiktok/Instagram/Youtube posts any time I mention #gunControl ...) BUT, even for content that I WANT people to find--primarily my topless equality content--again, it only shows up if followers of mine boost it to their own followers, and that's a very small niche. The only way we can ever hope to normalize gender-equal topless rights is if there are enough people putting pressure on social media sites and lawmakers to change their policies, and that requires a groundswell of support that's just not possible in isolated communities like Masto currently is. So I would LOVE some more methods for searchability, for people outside of my instance to find my content--and for me to find theirs.
I'm not a programmer, so I don't know how difficult this would be in reality. But the solution seems to me to be creating a searchable index, but making it opt-in only--accoounts like mine can opt-in to be found by people searching for #topless (who thereby might be influenced to think about topless equality, not just searching for porn), while others who want to keep their content protected (maybe searchable among their followers who they already trust, but not to the world wide web) can stay in the default opt-out status until they choose otherwise.
I've seen a few mentions of projects in the works LIKE this, but haven't seen one that's all the way working yet. If there's one that's mostly in working order, please recommend it! I'd love to give it a try.
-
CW: extended thoughts about searchability on the fediverse
Meme I quickly made about responses to the ongoing discussion about #searchability on the #fediverse. As a #contentCreator and #activist for #toplessEquality--which gets me banned repeatedly on all mainstream platforms even when I DO censor out my heinous female nipples (see https://www.toplesstopics.org/banned for receipts!), a primary motivator for me to use platforms like #mastodon is to be able to spread the word about #GenderEquality anti- #censorship among more potential supporters. But the lack of #searchability on Masto makes this very hard. I'm dependent on existing followers to boost my posts so others following -them- can see it, etc, but for whatever reason very few of my existing followers do. I also can't really find posts by other people outside of my instance and the people I'm following--like I've never seen another post about #vidcon besides my own, so I have no idea if anyone else on the fediverse is even messaging about it.
#Consent is of course a cornerstone of the fediverse experience, including someone consenting to whether or not they want a certain kind of content to pop up in their feeds. And having #contentWarnings and #altText encouraged if not required by most instances makes this place leagues more of a safe space for marginalized and/or traumatized people in a way that they cannot experience on mainstream platforms. But this can be very time-consuming and cumbersome, both remembering to add CWs and Alt Text to everything, coming up with custom text every time, and also on the end of it--when you follow enough people (or check out the public timelines) pressing "show content" over and over and over on each post gets REALLY annoying. But again, I'd rather have that tedium then have to subject myself to content that I find really triggering (for me, it's pretty much anything to do with kids and #gunViolence...I live in America where my kids are at risk of getting shot every day they go to school, and while I want to stay informed, I also need some mental prep before I look/read too much about it). And I know for others who have even more triggers, especially around things that the majority of people wouldn't find triggering (like pictures of food), then again, the fediverse is leagues better than the "normal" sites.
But back to searchability, as a veteran Twitter user (I cold-turkey quit in November, don't worry) I am well versed in how dealing with reactionary bullies who can take a tweet out of context and share it with their thousands if not millions of followers to dunk on you all at once. It can also open you up to a lot of haters in general, who will search out content like yours to leave hateful comments (like the comment sections of my Tiktok/Instagram/Youtube posts any time I mention #gunControl ...) BUT, even for content that I WANT people to find--primarily my topless equality content--again, it only shows up if followers of mine boost it to their own followers, and that's a very small niche. The only way we can ever hope to normalize gender-equal topless rights is if there are enough people putting pressure on social media sites and lawmakers to change their policies, and that requires a groundswell of support that's just not possible in isolated communities like Masto currently is. So I would LOVE some more methods for searchability, for people outside of my instance to find my content--and for me to find theirs.
I'm not a programmer, so I don't know how difficult this would be in reality. But the solution seems to me to be creating a searchable index, but making it opt-in only--accoounts like mine can opt-in to be found by people searching for #topless (who thereby might be influenced to think about topless equality, not just searching for porn), while others who want to keep their content protected (maybe searchable among their followers who they already trust, but not to the world wide web) can stay in the default opt-out status until they choose otherwise.
I've seen a few mentions of projects in the works LIKE this, but haven't seen one that's all the way working yet. If there's one that's mostly in working order, please recommend it! I'd love to give it a try.
-
CW: extended thoughts about searchability on the fediverse
Meme I quickly made about responses to the ongoing discussion about #searchability on the #fediverse. As a #contentCreator and #activist for #toplessEquality--which gets me banned repeatedly on all mainstream platforms even when I DO censor out my heinous female nipples (see https://www.toplesstopics.org/banned for receipts!), a primary motivator for me to use platforms like #mastodon is to be able to spread the word about #GenderEquality anti- #censorship among more potential supporters. But the lack of #searchability on Masto makes this very hard. I'm dependent on existing followers to boost my posts so others following -them- can see it, etc, but for whatever reason very few of my existing followers do. I also can't really find posts by other people outside of my instance and the people I'm following--like I've never seen another post about #vidcon besides my own, so I have no idea if anyone else on the fediverse is even messaging about it.
#Consent is of course a cornerstone of the fediverse experience, including someone consenting to whether or not they want a certain kind of content to pop up in their feeds. And having #contentWarnings and #altText encouraged if not required by most instances makes this place leagues more of a safe space for marginalized and/or traumatized people in a way that they cannot experience on mainstream platforms. But this can be very time-consuming and cumbersome, both remembering to add CWs and Alt Text to everything, coming up with custom text every time, and also on the end of it--when you follow enough people (or check out the public timelines) pressing "show content" over and over and over on each post gets REALLY annoying. But again, I'd rather have that tedium then have to subject myself to content that I find really triggering (for me, it's pretty much anything to do with kids and #gunViolence...I live in America where my kids are at risk of getting shot every day they go to school, and while I want to stay informed, I also need some mental prep before I look/read too much about it). And I know for others who have even more triggers, especially around things that the majority of people wouldn't find triggering (like pictures of food), then again, the fediverse is leagues better than the "normal" sites.
But back to searchability, as a veteran Twitter user (I cold-turkey quit in November, don't worry) I am well versed in how dealing with reactionary bullies who can take a tweet out of context and share it with their thousands if not millions of followers to dunk on you all at once. It can also open you up to a lot of haters in general, who will search out content like yours to leave hateful comments (like the comment sections of my Tiktok/Instagram/Youtube posts any time I mention #gunControl ...) BUT, even for content that I WANT people to find--primarily my topless equality content--again, it only shows up if followers of mine boost it to their own followers, and that's a very small niche. The only way we can ever hope to normalize gender-equal topless rights is if there are enough people putting pressure on social media sites and lawmakers to change their policies, and that requires a groundswell of support that's just not possible in isolated communities like Masto currently is. So I would LOVE some more methods for searchability, for people outside of my instance to find my content--and for me to find theirs.
I'm not a programmer, so I don't know how difficult this would be in reality. But the solution seems to me to be creating a searchable index, but making it opt-in only--accoounts like mine can opt-in to be found by people searching for #topless (who thereby might be influenced to think about topless equality, not just searching for porn), while others who want to keep their content protected (maybe searchable among their followers who they already trust, but not to the world wide web) can stay in the default opt-out status until they choose otherwise.
I've seen a few mentions of projects in the works LIKE this, but haven't seen one that's all the way working yet. If there's one that's mostly in working order, please recommend it! I'd love to give it a try.
-
CW: extended thoughts about searchability on the fediverse
Meme I quickly made about responses to the ongoing discussion about #searchability on the #fediverse. As a #contentCreator and #activist for #toplessEquality--which gets me banned repeatedly on all mainstream platforms even when I DO censor out my heinous female nipples (see https://www.toplesstopics.org/banned for receipts!), a primary motivator for me to use platforms like #mastodon is to be able to spread the word about #GenderEquality anti- #censorship among more potential supporters. But the lack of #searchability on Masto makes this very hard. I'm dependent on existing followers to boost my posts so others following -them- can see it, etc, but for whatever reason very few of my existing followers do. I also can't really find posts by other people outside of my instance and the people I'm following--like I've never seen another post about #vidcon besides my own, so I have no idea if anyone else on the fediverse is even messaging about it.
#Consent is of course a cornerstone of the fediverse experience, including someone consenting to whether or not they want a certain kind of content to pop up in their feeds. And having #contentWarnings and #altText encouraged if not required by most instances makes this place leagues more of a safe space for marginalized and/or traumatized people in a way that they cannot experience on mainstream platforms. But this can be very time-consuming and cumbersome, both remembering to add CWs and Alt Text to everything, coming up with custom text every time, and also on the end of it--when you follow enough people (or check out the public timelines) pressing "show content" over and over and over on each post gets REALLY annoying. But again, I'd rather have that tedium then have to subject myself to content that I find really triggering (for me, it's pretty much anything to do with kids and #gunViolence...I live in America where my kids are at risk of getting shot every day they go to school, and while I want to stay informed, I also need some mental prep before I look/read too much about it). And I know for others who have even more triggers, especially around things that the majority of people wouldn't find triggering (like pictures of food), then again, the fediverse is leagues better than the "normal" sites.
But back to searchability, as a veteran Twitter user (I cold-turkey quit in November, don't worry) I am well versed in how dealing with reactionary bullies who can take a tweet out of context and share it with their thousands if not millions of followers to dunk on you all at once. It can also open you up to a lot of haters in general, who will search out content like yours to leave hateful comments (like the comment sections of my Tiktok/Instagram/Youtube posts any time I mention #gunControl ...) BUT, even for content that I WANT people to find--primarily my topless equality content--again, it only shows up if followers of mine boost it to their own followers, and that's a very small niche. The only way we can ever hope to normalize gender-equal topless rights is if there are enough people putting pressure on social media sites and lawmakers to change their policies, and that requires a groundswell of support that's just not possible in isolated communities like Masto currently is. So I would LOVE some more methods for searchability, for people outside of my instance to find my content--and for me to find theirs.
I'm not a programmer, so I don't know how difficult this would be in reality. But the solution seems to me to be creating a searchable index, but making it opt-in only--accoounts like mine can opt-in to be found by people searching for #topless (who thereby might be influenced to think about topless equality, not just searching for porn), while others who want to keep their content protected (maybe searchable among their followers who they already trust, but not to the world wide web) can stay in the default opt-out status until they choose otherwise.
I've seen a few mentions of projects in the works LIKE this, but haven't seen one that's all the way working yet. If there's one that's mostly in working order, please recommend it! I'd love to give it a try.
-
Book Review: Bedlam Planet, John Brunner (1968)
(Jeff Jones’ cover for the 1968 edition)
3.25/5 (Vaguely Good)
To move past my variegated obsessions regarding William Kotzwinkle’s Doctor Rat (1976) (review + list of imaginary scientific articles), I decided to reread a lesser known John Brunner novel. I cannot pinpoint exactly when I first read Bedlam Plant (1968), other than before I started my site, but it holds up as a moody biological mystery with mythological undertones as colonists confront their deceptive new world.
This isn’t Stand on Zanzibar (1968), Shockwave Rider (1975), The Sheep Look Up (1972), or The Jagged Orbit (1969), but it left me wishing that Brunner applied his immersive near future SF skills to a vast, dark, far future tapestry. Brunner completists and fans of 1960s colonists on strange alien planet SF will not be disappointed—nor will you be blown away.
Far superior to the last John Brunner novel I read!
Analysis/Summary (*spoilers, as always*)
Dennis Malone is an explorer. He was one of the first four members of the expedition to the planet Asgard—“exposing themselves to the new planet to determine its habitability” (10). The men of the group, Dennis and Pyotr Tang-Lin, returned to Asgard with the colonization mission. Disaster strikes as Pyotr Tang-Lin crashes one of the three spaceships into the alien moon preventing Dennis from returning to Earth with any colonists who might be psychologically unsuitable for life on Asgard.
Dennis Malone is psychologically unsuitable for life on Asgard. Isolated and depressed, he spends his days bemoaning his fate. He is possessed by “the presence of the gashed terrible reproving moon” where Pyotr met his fate (5) wishing that he himself “had died on the alien moon” (12). An explorer at heart, he sinks into a morose state, characterized by Parvarti Chandra (one of the leaders of the colony) as a “martyr complex” (17). He seeks any release from the tedium of establishing the colony. As the colonists are comprised from the specialists of Earth, Malone’s own area of expertise is unneeded.
When a biological disaster–in the form of a mysterious scurvy caused by an illness that modifies the gut’s bacteria–rampages through the colony, Malone might have a use after all! Tai Men, a Chinese medic and biologist, suggests the only answer to the dilemma might be to ingest plants grown in Asgard’s soil: “but when it came to risking the delicate balance of their very bodies on the assurance of someone whose data they could not fully understand, it was different” (31).
When Dennis sets off across Asgard’s landscape to carry out various banal tasks assigned by the colony’s scientists, he accidentally discovers there might be a way out. But by the time he returns to the colony, madness has already descended. Or has it?
Final Thoughts
John Brunner expands on the basic biological mystery besets colonists on alien planet in an intelligent (although not entirely successful) manner. Underpinning the lives of the various colonists, is a mythological substructure based on the cultural memory each diverse colonist brings from Earth. Brunner explores mythological memory and mythological action in various ways. Dennis Malone and Sigrid Kallela, one of the first four explorers who live on the planet, engage leave a “symbolic mark” on Asgard by a passionate/violent coupling (38). In addition, Parvarti wants the colony to “develop their own” festivals derived from the ones of Earth to create a new cultural memory (36). A memory derived from that of Earth but suitable for the new society…
The novel concludes with an excerpt from a much later historical text about the colonists suggests that they all played the role of the planet’s first Gods. This is both good and bad for Brunner’s characterizations and plot. At times the narrative–especially as each character undergoes a culturally unique transformation in terms of their mythological knowledge–reads like Brunner placed sections of the Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology in a blender. Rather than focusing on individual powerful images, the story occasionally reads as an information dump in the form of a New Wave-esque descent into the metaphysical. As each colonist stands in for the accompanying cultural heritage, the diverse cast (Indian, Arab, African-American, Swedish, Chinese, Japanese, Greek, etc.) take on more archetypal (a clichéd) characterizations. Regardless, Brunner should be applauded for the women leaders and scientists, races, and religions represented by the crew, flawed although the representations might be.
Bedlam Planet attempts to break free from the straight-forward humankind settles alien planet template by emphasizing the psychological effects of colonists unable to return to Earth. The novel feels rushed although well-intentioned. If only similar ideas surrounding far future colonization were explored in a more refined and immersive experience à la The Jagged Orbit (1969) or Stand on Zanzibar (1968).
For more book reviews consult the INDEX
(Mike Rose’s cover for the 1973 edition)
(Uncredited cover for the 1975 edition)
(Darrell K. Sweet’s cover for the 1982 edition)
#1960s #bookReviews2 #colonialism #colonization #johnBrunner #paperbacks #pulp #sciFi #scienceFiction #spaceships #technology
-
“Always look on the bright side of life”*…
The estimable economic historian Louis Hyman has been engaged in an on-going “friendly debate” with his equally-estimable friend and Johns Hopkins colleague Rama Chellappa on “what AI means”…
… As I see this debate, this question of our age, there are two main questions that history can shed some light on.
- Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
- Will AI be controlled by the few or be accessible to the many?
A Complement or a Substitute?
Consider a some of the most important technologies of the past 200 years.
When I am asked about what automation might look like, I inevitably discuss agriculture. Roughly all of our ancestors were farmers and approximately none of us today are. Yet we still eat bread made from wheat. That shift is possible because of automation.
The mechanical thresher, used to process wheat, was a substitute for the most backbreaking work of the harvest. But it also enabled more land to be cultivated, and that land was cultivated more efficiently, allowing for greater harvests. Mechanization of the farm, like the thresher, turned the American Midwest into the breadbasket of the world.
Those displaced farmers found work on railroads, moving all that. And those jobs, according to people at the time, were a kind of liberation from the raw animal labor of threshing. On net, it created demand for more workers at better wages in work more fit for people than beasts. For those that remained farmers, they found other higher-value work to be done. On a farm, there is always more work to do.
The failure, then and now, is to think farmers were only threshers. That was one part of their jobs. Today, our work, for most people, is also a bundle of tasks. Workers then and now could and can focus on parts of their job that are of higher value. And in a new economy, new tasks in new industries will be created. Many of the jobs that we do today (web designer, UI expert) were simply unimaginable in 1850. That is a good thing.
Consider now the assembly line. I’m sure you all know about the staggering increases in productivity that come from the division of labor. If you take my class in industrial history, you would learn deeply about the story of the automobile. With the assembly line, and no other change in technology, car assembly went from 12 and a half hours to about 30 minutes (once they worked out the kinks). Did this reduce the demand for workers? No. It reduced the price of cars. And that increased the demand for workers, who eventually could demand even higher wages through unionization.
It is important here to realize that better tools don’t make us get paid worse. They generally make us get paid more. Why? Because the tool, without the person, is useless. Even for today’s most cutting-edge AIs, that is true. It can code, but it can only code what I imagine it to code. It can draw, but only what I imagine it to draw. That is true for AIs as it was true for the thresher.
So, I would offer that AI will create more growth, more abundance. In the long run, all growth comes from higher productivity.
I would add one more piece to this story. Economic inequality has worsened since roughly 1970. It has worsened, therefore, not in the industrial era, but the digital era. I have argued elsewhere that this happened because for decades we did not use computers as tools of automation but as glorified typewriters (and then as televisions). Our productivity did not increase, especially to justify the expense of computers. Economists have debated for decades now over the lack of increase in productivity that came with the “digital age” of computing, but it is simple. We don’t use them as computers. Now we can.
For the first time now, normal people with their normal problems can use their computers to solve and automate their problems. AI can write code. AI can automate their tedium. The digital age did not bring any gains because it had no yet arrived. We were living through the last gasp of the industrial economy.
It is now here.
This technology will unleash unimaginable productivity gains. It will level the playing field between coders and the rest of us. Coders will lose their jobs, to be sure, but for the rest of us, the bundle of workplace tasks will become much better.
And truthfully, the demand for real computer scientists will probably increase in the era of vibe-coding. Computer science itself is a bundle of skills, of which coding is just one. The more important skill – software and data architecture – will only increase in demand as the usefulness of software expands…
[Hyman goes on to explore the dangers of monopolization (which, for reasons he explains, he believes are overstated); the future of softward (which, he believes, will skew to open-sorce), and of hardware (which, he believes will not be a bottleneck). He concludes…]
… Put together we come to a very different picture of what the digital age will be. The industrial age required massive investments to build the factories to make the products that were in demand. In the digital age, in contrast, the factories to build digital products will be made by the AI on your laptop. That is not inequality. That is equality.
The physical products of the Fordist industrial age were made for the mass market. In contrast, the digital products of the post-fordist digital age will be long-tail products. I don’t need to make mass market products; I can make them for a small niche, or just for myself.
Rather than fostering inequality, AI, then, is a great equalizer. To make products for a global market you don’t need a billion-dollar factory. You just need a laptop. That is astonishing.
That said, it will not be all sunshine and rainbows. Will AI solve the inequities of capitalism or its reliance on externalities as a source of primitive accumulation? Probably not.
But at the same time, AI is not a normal technology in that it has the potential to radically undermine many of the tendencies to concentrate capital that we have seen in the industrial age. We have been automated out of work before, that is nothing new, but it has always concentrated capital in the hands of the few. For the first time, there is potentially an alternative path forward.
AI will bring the digital age out of the hands of the coders. AI will not widen the gap—it will bridge it. Its ubiquity will mean that AI will be a tool that nearly all of us will be able to use in our daily work, which will make ordinary people more productive and prosperous…
Eminently worth reading in full: “Hooray! Post-Fordism Is Finally Here!“
Even as Hyman’s message is reassuring in the context of the flood of jeremiads in which we’re awash, it’s worth remembering that eerily-similar points were made a couple of decades ago about the threat/promise of digital publishing/commerce. Given the then-current conditions and then-plausible futures, those predictions might have come true… but in the event, they didn’t pan out as projected. That said, things are changing, so maybe this time things are different?
(Image above: source)
* song (by Eric Idle) from Monty Python’s Life Of Brian
###
As we resolve to remain rosy, we might send productive birthday greetings to Andrew Meikle; he was born on this date in 1719. A Scottish millwright, he invented the threshing machine (for removing the husks from grain, as mentioned above). One of the key developments of the British Agricultural Revolution in the late 18th century., it was also one of the main causes of the Swing Riots— an 1830 uprising by English and Scottish agricultural workers protesting agricultural mechanization and harsh working conditions.
Threshing machine, invented by Andrew Meikle (source) #agriculture #AI #AndrewMeikle #artificialIntelligence #business #culture #economics #emplyment #Fordism #history #LongTail #LouisHyman #politics #SwingRiots #threshingMachine #work - Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
-
“Always look on the bright side of life”*…
The estimable economic historian Louis Hyman has been engaged in an on-going “friendly debate” with his equally-estimable friend and Johns Hopkins colleague Rama Chellappa on “what AI means”…
… As I see this debate, this question of our age, there are two main questions that history can shed some light on.
- Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
- Will AI be controlled by the few or be accessible to the many?
A Complement or a Substitute?
Consider a some of the most important technologies of the past 200 years.
When I am asked about what automation might look like, I inevitably discuss agriculture. Roughly all of our ancestors were farmers and approximately none of us today are. Yet we still eat bread made from wheat. That shift is possible because of automation.
The mechanical thresher, used to process wheat, was a substitute for the most backbreaking work of the harvest. But it also enabled more land to be cultivated, and that land was cultivated more efficiently, allowing for greater harvests. Mechanization of the farm, like the thresher, turned the American Midwest into the breadbasket of the world.
Those displaced farmers found work on railroads, moving all that. And those jobs, according to people at the time, were a kind of liberation from the raw animal labor of threshing. On net, it created demand for more workers at better wages in work more fit for people than beasts. For those that remained farmers, they found other higher-value work to be done. On a farm, there is always more work to do.
The failure, then and now, is to think farmers were only threshers. That was one part of their jobs. Today, our work, for most people, is also a bundle of tasks. Workers then and now could and can focus on parts of their job that are of higher value. And in a new economy, new tasks in new industries will be created. Many of the jobs that we do today (web designer, UI expert) were simply unimaginable in 1850. That is a good thing.
Consider now the assembly line. I’m sure you all know about the staggering increases in productivity that come from the division of labor. If you take my class in industrial history, you would learn deeply about the story of the automobile. With the assembly line, and no other change in technology, car assembly went from 12 and a half hours to about 30 minutes (once they worked out the kinks). Did this reduce the demand for workers? No. It reduced the price of cars. And that increased the demand for workers, who eventually could demand even higher wages through unionization.
It is important here to realize that better tools don’t make us get paid worse. They generally make us get paid more. Why? Because the tool, without the person, is useless. Even for today’s most cutting-edge AIs, that is true. It can code, but it can only code what I imagine it to code. It can draw, but only what I imagine it to draw. That is true for AIs as it was true for the thresher.
So, I would offer that AI will create more growth, more abundance. In the long run, all growth comes from higher productivity.
I would add one more piece to this story. Economic inequality has worsened since roughly 1970. It has worsened, therefore, not in the industrial era, but the digital era. I have argued elsewhere that this happened because for decades we did not use computers as tools of automation but as glorified typewriters (and then as televisions). Our productivity did not increase, especially to justify the expense of computers. Economists have debated for decades now over the lack of increase in productivity that came with the “digital age” of computing, but it is simple. We don’t use them as computers. Now we can.
For the first time now, normal people with their normal problems can use their computers to solve and automate their problems. AI can write code. AI can automate their tedium. The digital age did not bring any gains because it had no yet arrived. We were living through the last gasp of the industrial economy.
It is now here.
This technology will unleash unimaginable productivity gains. It will level the playing field between coders and the rest of us. Coders will lose their jobs, to be sure, but for the rest of us, the bundle of workplace tasks will become much better.
And truthfully, the demand for real computer scientists will probably increase in the era of vibe-coding. Computer science itself is a bundle of skills, of which coding is just one. The more important skill – software and data architecture – will only increase in demand as the usefulness of software expands…
[Hyman goes on to explore the dangers of monopolization (which, for reasons he explains, he believes are overstated); the future of softward (which, he believes, will skew to open-sorce), and of hardware (which, he believes will not be a bottleneck). He concludes…]
… Put together we come to a very different picture of what the digital age will be. The industrial age required massive investments to build the factories to make the products that were in demand. In the digital age, in contrast, the factories to build digital products will be made by the AI on your laptop. That is not inequality. That is equality.
The physical products of the Fordist industrial age were made for the mass market. In contrast, the digital products of the post-fordist digital age will be long-tail products. I don’t need to make mass market products; I can make them for a small niche, or just for myself.
Rather than fostering inequality, AI, then, is a great equalizer. To make products for a global market you don’t need a billion-dollar factory. You just need a laptop. That is astonishing.
That said, it will not be all sunshine and rainbows. Will AI solve the inequities of capitalism or its reliance on externalities as a source of primitive accumulation? Probably not.
But at the same time, AI is not a normal technology in that it has the potential to radically undermine many of the tendencies to concentrate capital that we have seen in the industrial age. We have been automated out of work before, that is nothing new, but it has always concentrated capital in the hands of the few. For the first time, there is potentially an alternative path forward.
AI will bring the digital age out of the hands of the coders. AI will not widen the gap—it will bridge it. Its ubiquity will mean that AI will be a tool that nearly all of us will be able to use in our daily work, which will make ordinary people more productive and prosperous…
Eminently worth reading in full: “Hooray! Post-Fordism Is Finally Here!“
Even as Hyman’s message is reassuring in the context of the flood of jeremiads in which we’re awash, it’s worth remembering that eerily-similar points were made a couple of decades ago about the threat/promise of digital publishing/commerce. Given the then-current conditions and then-plausible futures, those predictions might have come true… but in the event, they didn’t pan out as projected. That said, things are changing, so maybe this time things are different?
(Image above: source)
* song (by Eric Idle) from Monty Python’s Life Of Brian
###
As we resolve to remain rosy, we might send productive birthday greetings to Andrew Meikle; he was born on this date in 1719. A Scottish millwright, he invented the threshing machine (for removing the husks from grain, as mentioned above). One of the key developments of the British Agricultural Revolution in the late 18th century., it was also one of the main causes of the Swing Riots— an 1830 uprising by English and Scottish agricultural workers protesting agricultural mechanization and harsh working conditions.
Threshing machine, invented by Andrew Meikle (source) #agriculture #AI #AndrewMeikle #artificialIntelligence #business #culture #economics #Fordism #history #LongTail #LouisHyman #politics #SwingRiots #threshingMachine #work - Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
-
“Always look on the bright side of life”*…
The estimable economic historian Louis Hyman has been engaged in an on-going “friendly debate” with his equally-estimable friend and Johns Hopkins colleague Rama Chellappa on “what AI means”…
… As I see this debate, this question of our age, there are two main questions that history can shed some light on.
- Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
- Will AI be controlled by the few or be accessible to the many?
A Complement or a Substitute?
Consider a some of the most important technologies of the past 200 years.
When I am asked about what automation might look like, I inevitably discuss agriculture. Roughly all of our ancestors were farmers and approximately none of us today are. Yet we still eat bread made from wheat. That shift is possible because of automation.
The mechanical thresher, used to process wheat, was a substitute for the most backbreaking work of the harvest. But it also enabled more land to be cultivated, and that land was cultivated more efficiently, allowing for greater harvests. Mechanization of the farm, like the thresher, turned the American Midwest into the breadbasket of the world.
Those displaced farmers found work on railroads, moving all that. And those jobs, according to people at the time, were a kind of liberation from the raw animal labor of threshing. On net, it created demand for more workers at better wages in work more fit for people than beasts. For those that remained farmers, they found other higher-value work to be done. On a farm, there is always more work to do.
The failure, then and now, is to think farmers were only threshers. That was one part of their jobs. Today, our work, for most people, is also a bundle of tasks. Workers then and now could and can focus on parts of their job that are of higher value. And in a new economy, new tasks in new industries will be created. Many of the jobs that we do today (web designer, UI expert) were simply unimaginable in 1850. That is a good thing.
Consider now the assembly line. I’m sure you all know about the staggering increases in productivity that come from the division of labor. If you take my class in industrial history, you would learn deeply about the story of the automobile. With the assembly line, and no other change in technology, car assembly went from 12 and a half hours to about 30 minutes (once they worked out the kinks). Did this reduce the demand for workers? No. It reduced the price of cars. And that increased the demand for workers, who eventually could demand even higher wages through unionization.
It is important here to realize that better tools don’t make us get paid worse. They generally make us get paid more. Why? Because the tool, without the person, is useless. Even for today’s most cutting-edge AIs, that is true. It can code, but it can only code what I imagine it to code. It can draw, but only what I imagine it to draw. That is true for AIs as it was true for the thresher.
So, I would offer that AI will create more growth, more abundance. In the long run, all growth comes from higher productivity.
I would add one more piece to this story. Economic inequality has worsened since roughly 1970. It has worsened, therefore, not in the industrial era, but the digital era. I have argued elsewhere that this happened because for decades we did not use computers as tools of automation but as glorified typewriters (and then as televisions). Our productivity did not increase, especially to justify the expense of computers. Economists have debated for decades now over the lack of increase in productivity that came with the “digital age” of computing, but it is simple. We don’t use them as computers. Now we can.
For the first time now, normal people with their normal problems can use their computers to solve and automate their problems. AI can write code. AI can automate their tedium. The digital age did not bring any gains because it had no yet arrived. We were living through the last gasp of the industrial economy.
It is now here.
This technology will unleash unimaginable productivity gains. It will level the playing field between coders and the rest of us. Coders will lose their jobs, to be sure, but for the rest of us, the bundle of workplace tasks will become much better.
And truthfully, the demand for real computer scientists will probably increase in the era of vibe-coding. Computer science itself is a bundle of skills, of which coding is just one. The more important skill – software and data architecture – will only increase in demand as the usefulness of software expands…
[Hyman goes on to explore the dangers of monopolization (which, for reasons he explains, he believes are overstated); the future of softward (which, he believes, will skew to open-sorce), and of hardware (which, he believes will not be a bottleneck). He concludes…]
… Put together we come to a very different picture of what the digital age will be. The industrial age required massive investments to build the factories to make the products that were in demand. In the digital age, in contrast, the factories to build digital products will be made by the AI on your laptop. That is not inequality. That is equality.
The physical products of the Fordist industrial age were made for the mass market. In contrast, the digital products of the post-fordist digital age will be long-tail products. I don’t need to make mass market products; I can make them for a small niche, or just for myself.
Rather than fostering inequality, AI, then, is a great equalizer. To make products for a global market you don’t need a billion-dollar factory. You just need a laptop. That is astonishing.
That said, it will not be all sunshine and rainbows. Will AI solve the inequities of capitalism or its reliance on externalities as a source of primitive accumulation? Probably not.
But at the same time, AI is not a normal technology in that it has the potential to radically undermine many of the tendencies to concentrate capital that we have seen in the industrial age. We have been automated out of work before, that is nothing new, but it has always concentrated capital in the hands of the few. For the first time, there is potentially an alternative path forward.
AI will bring the digital age out of the hands of the coders. AI will not widen the gap—it will bridge it. Its ubiquity will mean that AI will be a tool that nearly all of us will be able to use in our daily work, which will make ordinary people more productive and prosperous…
Eminently worth reading in full: “Hooray! Post-Fordism Is Finally Here!“
Even as Hyman’s message is reassuring in the context of the flood of jeremiads in which we’re awash, it’s worth remembering that eerily-similar points were made a couple of decades ago about the threat/promise of digital publishing/commerce. Given the then-current conditions and then-plausible futures, those predictions might have come true… but in the event, they didn’t pan out as projected. That said, things are changing, so maybe this time things are different?
(Image above: source)
* song (by Eric Idle) from Monty Python’s Life Of Brian
###
As we resolve to remain rosy, we might send productive birthday greetings to Andrew Meikle; he was born on this date in 1719. A Scottish millwright, he invented the threshing machine (for removing the husks from grain, as mentioned above). One of the key developments of the British Agricultural Revolution in the late 18th century., it was also one of the main causes of the Swing Riots— an 1830 uprising by English and Scottish agricultural workers protesting agricultural mechanization and harsh working conditions.
Threshing machine, invented by Andrew Meikle (source) #agriculture #AI #AndrewMeikle #artificialIntelligence #business #culture #economics #Fordism #history #LongTail #LouisHyman #politics #SwingRiots #threshingMachine #work - Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
-
“Always look on the bright side of life”*…
The estimable economic historian Louis Hyman has been engaged in an on-going “friendly debate” with his equally-estimable friend and Johns Hopkins colleague Rama Chellappa on “what AI means”…
… As I see this debate, this question of our age, there are two main questions that history can shed some light on.
- Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
- Will AI be controlled by the few or be accessible to the many?
A Complement or a Substitute?
Consider a some of the most important technologies of the past 200 years.
When I am asked about what automation might look like, I inevitably discuss agriculture. Roughly all of our ancestors were farmers and approximately none of us today are. Yet we still eat bread made from wheat. That shift is possible because of automation.
The mechanical thresher, used to process wheat, was a substitute for the most backbreaking work of the harvest. But it also enabled more land to be cultivated, and that land was cultivated more efficiently, allowing for greater harvests. Mechanization of the farm, like the thresher, turned the American Midwest into the breadbasket of the world.
Those displaced farmers found work on railroads, moving all that. And those jobs, according to people at the time, were a kind of liberation from the raw animal labor of threshing. On net, it created demand for more workers at better wages in work more fit for people than beasts. For those that remained farmers, they found other higher-value work to be done. On a farm, there is always more work to do.
The failure, then and now, is to think farmers were only threshers. That was one part of their jobs. Today, our work, for most people, is also a bundle of tasks. Workers then and now could and can focus on parts of their job that are of higher value. And in a new economy, new tasks in new industries will be created. Many of the jobs that we do today (web designer, UI expert) were simply unimaginable in 1850. That is a good thing.
Consider now the assembly line. I’m sure you all know about the staggering increases in productivity that come from the division of labor. If you take my class in industrial history, you would learn deeply about the story of the automobile. With the assembly line, and no other change in technology, car assembly went from 12 and a half hours to about 30 minutes (once they worked out the kinks). Did this reduce the demand for workers? No. It reduced the price of cars. And that increased the demand for workers, who eventually could demand even higher wages through unionization.
It is important here to realize that better tools don’t make us get paid worse. They generally make us get paid more. Why? Because the tool, without the person, is useless. Even for today’s most cutting-edge AIs, that is true. It can code, but it can only code what I imagine it to code. It can draw, but only what I imagine it to draw. That is true for AIs as it was true for the thresher.
So, I would offer that AI will create more growth, more abundance. In the long run, all growth comes from higher productivity.
I would add one more piece to this story. Economic inequality has worsened since roughly 1970. It has worsened, therefore, not in the industrial era, but the digital era. I have argued elsewhere that this happened because for decades we did not use computers as tools of automation but as glorified typewriters (and then as televisions). Our productivity did not increase, especially to justify the expense of computers. Economists have debated for decades now over the lack of increase in productivity that came with the “digital age” of computing, but it is simple. We don’t use them as computers. Now we can.
For the first time now, normal people with their normal problems can use their computers to solve and automate their problems. AI can write code. AI can automate their tedium. The digital age did not bring any gains because it had no yet arrived. We were living through the last gasp of the industrial economy.
It is now here.
This technology will unleash unimaginable productivity gains. It will level the playing field between coders and the rest of us. Coders will lose their jobs, to be sure, but for the rest of us, the bundle of workplace tasks will become much better.
And truthfully, the demand for real computer scientists will probably increase in the era of vibe-coding. Computer science itself is a bundle of skills, of which coding is just one. The more important skill – software and data architecture – will only increase in demand as the usefulness of software expands…
[Hyman goes on to explore the dangers of monopolization (which, for reasons he explains, he believes are overstated); the future of softward (which, he believes, will skew to open-sorce), and of hardware (which, he believes will not be a bottleneck). He concludes…]
… Put together we come to a very different picture of what the digital age will be. The industrial age required massive investments to build the factories to make the products that were in demand. In the digital age, in contrast, the factories to build digital products will be made by the AI on your laptop. That is not inequality. That is equality.
The physical products of the Fordist industrial age were made for the mass market. In contrast, the digital products of the post-fordist digital age will be long-tail products. I don’t need to make mass market products; I can make them for a small niche, or just for myself.
Rather than fostering inequality, AI, then, is a great equalizer. To make products for a global market you don’t need a billion-dollar factory. You just need a laptop. That is astonishing.
That said, it will not be all sunshine and rainbows. Will AI solve the inequities of capitalism or its reliance on externalities as a source of primitive accumulation? Probably not.
But at the same time, AI is not a normal technology in that it has the potential to radically undermine many of the tendencies to concentrate capital that we have seen in the industrial age. We have been automated out of work before, that is nothing new, but it has always concentrated capital in the hands of the few. For the first time, there is potentially an alternative path forward.
AI will bring the digital age out of the hands of the coders. AI will not widen the gap—it will bridge it. Its ubiquity will mean that AI will be a tool that nearly all of us will be able to use in our daily work, which will make ordinary people more productive and prosperous…
Eminently worth reading in full: “Hooray! Post-Fordism Is Finally Here!“
Even as Hyman’s message is reassuring in the context of the flood of jeremiads in which we’re awash, it’s worth remembering that eerily-similar points were made a couple of decades ago about the threat/promise of digital publishing/commerce. Given the then-current conditions and then-plausible futures, those predictions might have come true… but in the event, they didn’t pan out as projected. That said, things are changing, so maybe this time things are different?
(Image above: source)
* song (by Eric Idle) from Monty Python’s Life Of Brian
###
As we resolve to remain rosy, we might send productive birthday greetings to Andrew Meikle; he was born on this date in 1719. A Scottish millwright, he invented the threshing machine (for removing the husks from grain, as mentioned above). One of the key developments of the British Agricultural Revolution in the late 18th century., it was also one of the main causes of the Swing Riots— an 1830 uprising by English and Scottish agricultural workers protesting agricultural mechanization and harsh working conditions.
Threshing machine, invented by Andrew Meikle (source) #agriculture #AI #AndrewMeikle #artificialIntelligence #business #culture #economics #Fordism #history #LongTail #LouisHyman #politics #SwingRiots #threshingMachine #work - Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
-
“Always look on the bright side of life”*…
The estimable economic historian Louis Hyman has been engaged in an on-going “friendly debate” with his equally-estimable friend and Johns Hopkins colleague Rama Chellappa on “what AI means”…
… As I see this debate, this question of our age, there are two main questions that history can shed some light on.
- Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
- Will AI be controlled by the few or be accessible to the many?
A Complement or a Substitute?
Consider a some of the most important technologies of the past 200 years.
When I am asked about what automation might look like, I inevitably discuss agriculture. Roughly all of our ancestors were farmers and approximately none of us today are. Yet we still eat bread made from wheat. That shift is possible because of automation.
The mechanical thresher, used to process wheat, was a substitute for the most backbreaking work of the harvest. But it also enabled more land to be cultivated, and that land was cultivated more efficiently, allowing for greater harvests. Mechanization of the farm, like the thresher, turned the American Midwest into the breadbasket of the world.
Those displaced farmers found work on railroads, moving all that. And those jobs, according to people at the time, were a kind of liberation from the raw animal labor of threshing. On net, it created demand for more workers at better wages in work more fit for people than beasts. For those that remained farmers, they found other higher-value work to be done. On a farm, there is always more work to do.
The failure, then and now, is to think farmers were only threshers. That was one part of their jobs. Today, our work, for most people, is also a bundle of tasks. Workers then and now could and can focus on parts of their job that are of higher value. And in a new economy, new tasks in new industries will be created. Many of the jobs that we do today (web designer, UI expert) were simply unimaginable in 1850. That is a good thing.
Consider now the assembly line. I’m sure you all know about the staggering increases in productivity that come from the division of labor. If you take my class in industrial history, you would learn deeply about the story of the automobile. With the assembly line, and no other change in technology, car assembly went from 12 and a half hours to about 30 minutes (once they worked out the kinks). Did this reduce the demand for workers? No. It reduced the price of cars. And that increased the demand for workers, who eventually could demand even higher wages through unionization.
It is important here to realize that better tools don’t make us get paid worse. They generally make us get paid more. Why? Because the tool, without the person, is useless. Even for today’s most cutting-edge AIs, that is true. It can code, but it can only code what I imagine it to code. It can draw, but only what I imagine it to draw. That is true for AIs as it was true for the thresher.
So, I would offer that AI will create more growth, more abundance. In the long run, all growth comes from higher productivity.
I would add one more piece to this story. Economic inequality has worsened since roughly 1970. It has worsened, therefore, not in the industrial era, but the digital era. I have argued elsewhere that this happened because for decades we did not use computers as tools of automation but as glorified typewriters (and then as televisions). Our productivity did not increase, especially to justify the expense of computers. Economists have debated for decades now over the lack of increase in productivity that came with the “digital age” of computing, but it is simple. We don’t use them as computers. Now we can.
For the first time now, normal people with their normal problems can use their computers to solve and automate their problems. AI can write code. AI can automate their tedium. The digital age did not bring any gains because it had no yet arrived. We were living through the last gasp of the industrial economy.
It is now here.
This technology will unleash unimaginable productivity gains. It will level the playing field between coders and the rest of us. Coders will lose their jobs, to be sure, but for the rest of us, the bundle of workplace tasks will become much better.
And truthfully, the demand for real computer scientists will probably increase in the era of vibe-coding. Computer science itself is a bundle of skills, of which coding is just one. The more important skill – software and data architecture – will only increase in demand as the usefulness of software expands…
[Hyman goes on to explore the dangers of monopolization (which, for reasons he explains, he believes are overstated); the future of softward (which, he believes, will skew to open-sorce), and of hardware (which, he believes will not be a bottleneck). He concludes…]
… Put together we come to a very different picture of what the digital age will be. The industrial age required massive investments to build the factories to make the products that were in demand. In the digital age, in contrast, the factories to build digital products will be made by the AI on your laptop. That is not inequality. That is equality.
The physical products of the Fordist industrial age were made for the mass market. In contrast, the digital products of the post-fordist digital age will be long-tail products. I don’t need to make mass market products; I can make them for a small niche, or just for myself.
Rather than fostering inequality, AI, then, is a great equalizer. To make products for a global market you don’t need a billion-dollar factory. You just need a laptop. That is astonishing.
That said, it will not be all sunshine and rainbows. Will AI solve the inequities of capitalism or its reliance on externalities as a source of primitive accumulation? Probably not.
But at the same time, AI is not a normal technology in that it has the potential to radically undermine many of the tendencies to concentrate capital that we have seen in the industrial age. We have been automated out of work before, that is nothing new, but it has always concentrated capital in the hands of the few. For the first time, there is potentially an alternative path forward.
AI will bring the digital age out of the hands of the coders. AI will not widen the gap—it will bridge it. Its ubiquity will mean that AI will be a tool that nearly all of us will be able to use in our daily work, which will make ordinary people more productive and prosperous…
Eminently worth reading in full: “Hooray! Post-Fordism Is Finally Here!“
Even as Hyman’s message is reassuring in the context of the flood of jeremiads in which we’re awash, it’s worth remembering that eerily-similar points were made a couple of decades ago about the threat/promise of digital publishing/commerce. Given the then-current conditions and then-plausible futures, those predictions might have come true… but in the event, they didn’t pan out as projected. That said, things are changing, so maybe this time things are different?
(Image above: source)
* song (by Eric Idle) from Monty Python’s Life Of Brian
###
As we resolve to remain rosy, we might send productive birthday greetings to Andrew Meikle; he was born on this date in 1719. A Scottish millwright, he invented the threshing machine (for removing the husks from grain, as mentioned above). One of the key developments of the British Agricultural Revolution in the late 18th century., it was also one of the main causes of the Swing Riots— an 1830 uprising by English and Scottish agricultural workers protesting agricultural mechanization and harsh working conditions.
Threshing machine, invented by Andrew Meikle (source) #agriculture #AI #AndrewMeikle #artificialIntelligence #business #culture #economics #emplyment #Fordism #history #LongTail #LouisHyman #politics #SwingRiots #threshingMachine #work - Is AI a complement or a substitute for labor? That is, will it increase demand for and the productivity of workers, or decrease it?
-
Destroying Autocracy – June 19, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
DA comes out on Thursday and is updated through the end of day on Friday. Then we start over. So take your time in perusing it and check back in over the weekend.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
Featured Item
404 Media reports:
AI Scraping Bots Are Breaking Open Libraries, Archives, and Museums
When you use AI, you contribute to this c^ntitry.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
Micah Flee explores:
Using Signal groups for activism
The Guardian reports:
Makers of air fryers and smart speakers told to respect users’ right to privacy
Spy ships, cyber-attacks and shadow fleets: the crack security team braced for trouble at sea
TechCrunch reports:
The ‘OpenAI Files’ push for oversight in the race to AGI
The Register reports:
LibreOffice adds voice to ‘ditch Windows for Linux’ campaign
Microsoft brings 365 suite on-prem as part of sovereign cloud push
France 24 reports:
‘We’re done with Teams’: German state hits uninstall on Microsoft
TechPolicy shares:
What the EU Needs to Do to Challenge Big Tech Cloud Dominance
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Apple to Australians: You’re Too Stupid to Choose Your Own Apps
BleepingComputer reports:
Police seizes Archetyp Market drug marketplace, arrests admin
The Register reviews:
/e/ OS 3.0: Slightly less clunky, slightly more private
Vox reports:
He’s the godfather of AI. Now, he has a bold new plan to keep us safe from it.
Neutral
The Register reports:
The launch of ChatGPT polluted the world forever, like the first atomic weapons tests
Euronews reports:
Dutch online platform watchdog struggling to connect with other EU member states
The Register reports:
MiniMax M1 model claims Chinese LLM crown from DeepSeek – plus it’s true open-source
Dems hyperventilate about Palantir’s work with the IRS in letter to CEO Karp
I would trust Palantir as far as I could kick their CEO.
The Evil Empire Strikes Back
404 Media reports:
Emails Reveal the Casual Surveillance Alliance Between ICE and Local Police
California Cops Investigate ‘Immigration Protest’ With AI-Camera System
The Markup reports:
California police are illegally sharing license plate data with ICE and Border Patrol
The Kyiv Independent reports:
Open Rights Group reports:
Police forces to get authoritarian powers to extract data from online accounts
False alarm: fake news and the right fuel attack on NGOs
EuroNews reports:
Ukrainian journalists fear USAID cuts opened up space for Russian disinformation campaigns
Pariah States
DarkReading reports:
‘HoldingHands’ Acts Like a Pickpocket With Taiwan Orgs
Iran-Israel War Triggers a Maelstrom in Cyberspace
Paragon Commercial Spyware Infects Prominent Journalists
The Register reports:
Amazon CISO: Iranian hacking crews ‘on high alert’ since Israel attack
404 Media reports:
The AI Slop Fight Between Iran and Israel
EuroNews reports:
Israel’s spy agency used AI and smuggled-in drones to prepare attack on Iran, sources say
Bleeping Computer reports:
North Korean hackers deepfake execs in Zoom call to spread Mac malware
Telecom giant Viasat breached by China’s Salt Typhoon hackers
Citizen Lab reports:
Same Sea, New Phish: Russian Government-Linked Social Engineering Targets App-Specific Passwords
Big Media
The Guardian reports:
The mainstream media has enabled Trump’s war on universities
BleepingComputer reports:
Washington Post’s email system hacked, journalists’ accounts compromised
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting reports:
Working Hard to Justify Israel’s Unprovoked Attack on Iran
One Man and his Blog reports:
Digital News Report 2025: exponential media change is here
Big Tech
Ars Technica reports:
OpenAI weighs “nuclear option” of antitrust complaint against Microsoft
How surprising. Two big tech c^nts can’t get along.
The Register reports:
Salesforce study finds LLM agents flunk CRM and confidentiality tests
‘AI is not doing its job and should leave us alone’ says Gartner’s top analyst
Absolutely.
noyb reports:
WhatsApp is getting ads using personal data from Instagram and Facebook
The Guardian reports:
(AI)‘It’s terrifying’: WhatsApp AI helper mistakenly shares user’s number
TechCrunch reports:
xAI is facing a lawsuit for operating over 400 MW of gas turbines without permits
Tumblr’s content-filtering systems have been falsely flagging posts as ‘mature,’ users blame AI
Instagram users complain of mass bans, pointing finger at AI
BleepingComputer reports:
Instagram ‘BMO’ ads use AI deepfakes to scam banking customers
BellingCat reports:
Ludic Mataroa schools the AI Bros:
Contra Ptacek’s Terrible Article On AI
Wired reports:
How Much Energy Does AI Use? The People Who Know Aren’t Saying
The BBC reports:
Is Google about to destroy the web?
Antitrust Intelligence reports:
Microsoft Could Repeat its Teams Strategy, this time with Bing and Edge
The Markup reports:
We caught 4 more states sharing personal health data with Big Tech
Terror
404 Media reports:
The People Search Sites in the Suspected Minnesota Killer’s Notebook Are a Failure of Congress
Cybersecurity/Privacy
Krebs on Security reports:
Inside a Dark Adtech Empire Fed by Fake CAPTCHAs
The Register reports:
Sitecore CMS flaw let attackers brute-force ‘b’ for backdoor
Fuck corporate CMSs.
BleepingComputer reports:
DuckDuckGo beefs up scam defense to block fake stores, crypto sites
Fediverse
The Fediverse Report reports:
The W3C Community Group looks at:
Messaging Layer Security over ActivityPub
Timothy Chambers shares:
The Seven Deadly UX Sins of the Fediverse Web Experience (To Fix)
Mastodon has:
Mastodon is a digital public good
Emily McClue has a bone to pick with them:
New Terms of Service IP clause cannot be terminated or revoked, not even by deleting content
PeerTube announces:
App crowdfunding — Let’s go live!
Elena Rossini shares a valuable asset:
Ghost is:
Bonfire announces:
ActivityPub for WordPress announces:
New Look, Faster Blocks in ActivityPub 6.0.0
TechCrunch reports:
Mastodon updates its terms to prohibit AI model training
Threads is testing spoiler text, Zuckerberg says
Threads expands open social web integrations with fediverse feed, user profile search
Remember to block the instance, threads.net.
Other Slightly Federated Social Media
The Fediverse Report has:
Mathew Ingram says:
Reports of Bluesky’s death have been greatly exaggerated
Tedium shares:
Again, none of this would matter if Bluesky were not a company trying to make money and in debt to VCs.
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#121 #ActivityPub #AI #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Bluesky #Bonfire #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Ghost #Mastodon #Peertube #StopChina #StopIran #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism #Threads #WordPress
-
Destroying Autocracy – June 19, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
DA comes out on Thursday and is updated through the end of day on Friday. Then we start over. So take your time in perusing it and check back in over the weekend.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
Featured Item
404 Media reports:
AI Scraping Bots Are Breaking Open Libraries, Archives, and Museums
When you use AI, you contribute to this c^ntitry.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
Micah Flee explores:
Using Signal groups for activism
The Guardian reports:
Makers of air fryers and smart speakers told to respect users’ right to privacy
Spy ships, cyber-attacks and shadow fleets: the crack security team braced for trouble at sea
TechCrunch reports:
The ‘OpenAI Files’ push for oversight in the race to AGI
The Register reports:
LibreOffice adds voice to ‘ditch Windows for Linux’ campaign
Microsoft brings 365 suite on-prem as part of sovereign cloud push
France 24 reports:
‘We’re done with Teams’: German state hits uninstall on Microsoft
TechPolicy shares:
What the EU Needs to Do to Challenge Big Tech Cloud Dominance
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Apple to Australians: You’re Too Stupid to Choose Your Own Apps
BleepingComputer reports:
Police seizes Archetyp Market drug marketplace, arrests admin
The Register reviews:
/e/ OS 3.0: Slightly less clunky, slightly more private
Neutral
The Register reports:
The launch of ChatGPT polluted the world forever, like the first atomic weapons tests
Euronews reports:
Dutch online platform watchdog struggling to connect with other EU member states
The Register reports:
MiniMax M1 model claims Chinese LLM crown from DeepSeek – plus it’s true open-source
Dems hyperventilate about Palantir’s work with the IRS in letter to CEO Karp
I would trust Palantir as far as I could kick their CEO.
The Evil Empire Strikes Back
404 Media reports:
Emails Reveal the Casual Surveillance Alliance Between ICE and Local Police
California Cops Investigate ‘Immigration Protest’ With AI-Camera System
The Kyiv Independent reports:
Open Rights Group reports:
Police forces to get authoritarian powers to extract data from online accounts
Pariah States
DarkReading reports:
‘HoldingHands’ Acts Like a Pickpocket With Taiwan Orgs
Paragon Commercial Spyware Infects Prominent Journalists
The Register reports:
Amazon CISO: Iranian hacking crews ‘on high alert’ since Israel attack
404 Media reports:
The AI Slop Fight Between Iran and Israel
EuroNews reports:
Israel’s spy agency used AI and smuggled-in drones to prepare attack on Iran, sources say
Bleeping Computer reports:
North Korean hackers deepfake execs in Zoom call to spread Mac malware
Big Media
The Guardian reports:
The mainstream media has enabled Trump’s war on universities
BleepingComputer reports:
[Washington Post’s email system hacked, journalists’ accounts compromised]
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/washington-posts-email-system-hacked-journalists-accounts-compromised/Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting reports:
Working Hard to Justify Israel’s Unprovoked Attack on Iran
Big Media
Ars Technica reports:
OpenAI weighs “nuclear option” of antitrust complaint against Microsoft
How surprising. Two big tech c^nts can’t get along.
The Register reports:
Salesforce study finds LLM agents flunk CRM and confidentiality tests
‘AI is not doing its job and should leave us alone’ says Gartner’s top analyst
Absolutely.
noyb reports:
WhatsApp is getting ads using personal data from Instagram and Facebook
The Guardian reports:
(AI)‘It’s terrifying’: WhatsApp AI helper mistakenly shares user’s number
TechCrunch reports:
xAI is facing a lawsuit for operating over 400 MW of gas turbines without permits
Tumblr’s content-filtering systems have been falsely flagging posts as ‘mature,’ users blame AI
Instagram users complain of mass bans, pointing finger at AI
BleepingComputer reports:
Instagram ‘BMO’ ads use AI deepfakes to scam banking customers
BellingCat reports:
The BBC reports:
Is Google about to destroy the web?
Antitrust Intelligence reports:
Microsoft Could Repeat its Teams Strategy, this time with Bing and Edge
The Markup reports:
We caught 4 more states sharing personal health data with Big Tech
Big Tech
404 Media reports:
The People Search Sites in the Suspected Minnesota Killer’s Notebook Are a Failure of Congress
Cybersecurity/Privacy
Krebs on Security reports:
Inside a Dark Adtech Empire Fed by Fake CAPTCHAs
Fediverse
The Fediverse Report reports:
The W3C Community Group looks at:
Messaging Layer Security over ActivityPub
Timothy Chambers shares:
The Seven Deadly UX Sins of the Fediverse Web Experience (To Fix)
Mastodon has:
Mastodon is a digital public good
Emily McClue has a bone to pick with them:
New Terms of Service IP clause cannot be terminated or revoked, not even by deleting content
PeerTube announces:
App crowdfunding — Let’s go live!
Elena Rossini shares a valuable asset:
Ghost is:
Bonfire announces:
ActivityPub for WordPress announces:
New Look, Faster Blocks in ActivityPub 6.0.0
TechCrunch reports:
Mastodon updates its terms to prohibit AI model training
Threads is testing spoiler text, Zuckerberg says
Threads expands open social web integrations with fediverse feed, user profile search
Remember to block the instance, threads.net.
Other Slightly Federated Social Media
Tedium shares:
Again, none of this would matter if Bluesky were not a company trying to make money and in debt to VCs.
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#ActivityPub #AI #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Bluesky #Bonfire #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Ghost #Mastodon #Peertube #StopChina #StopIran #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism #Threads #WordPress
-
Destroying Autocracy – June 19, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
DA comes out on Thursday and is updated through the end of day on Friday. Then we start over. So take your time in perusing it and check back in over the weekend.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
Featured Item
404 Media reports:
AI Scraping Bots Are Breaking Open Libraries, Archives, and Museums
When you use AI, you contribute to this c^ntitry.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
Micah Flee explores:
Using Signal groups for activism
The Guardian reports:
Makers of air fryers and smart speakers told to respect users’ right to privacy
Spy ships, cyber-attacks and shadow fleets: the crack security team braced for trouble at sea
TechCrunch reports:
The ‘OpenAI Files’ push for oversight in the race to AGI
The Register reports:
LibreOffice adds voice to ‘ditch Windows for Linux’ campaign
Microsoft brings 365 suite on-prem as part of sovereign cloud push
France 24 reports:
‘We’re done with Teams’: German state hits uninstall on Microsoft
TechPolicy shares:
What the EU Needs to Do to Challenge Big Tech Cloud Dominance
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Apple to Australians: You’re Too Stupid to Choose Your Own Apps
BleepingComputer reports:
Police seizes Archetyp Market drug marketplace, arrests admin
The Register reviews:
/e/ OS 3.0: Slightly less clunky, slightly more private
Neutral
The Register reports:
The launch of ChatGPT polluted the world forever, like the first atomic weapons tests
Euronews reports:
Dutch online platform watchdog struggling to connect with other EU member states
The Register reports:
MiniMax M1 model claims Chinese LLM crown from DeepSeek – plus it’s true open-source
Dems hyperventilate about Palantir’s work with the IRS in letter to CEO Karp
I would trust Palantir as far as I could kick their CEO.
The Evil Empire Strikes Back
404 Media reports:
Emails Reveal the Casual Surveillance Alliance Between ICE and Local Police
California Cops Investigate ‘Immigration Protest’ With AI-Camera System
The Kyiv Independent reports:
Open Rights Group reports:
Police forces to get authoritarian powers to extract data from online accounts
Pariah States
DarkReading reports:
‘HoldingHands’ Acts Like a Pickpocket With Taiwan Orgs
Paragon Commercial Spyware Infects Prominent Journalists
The Register reports:
Amazon CISO: Iranian hacking crews ‘on high alert’ since Israel attack
404 Media reports:
The AI Slop Fight Between Iran and Israel
EuroNews reports:
Israel’s spy agency used AI and smuggled-in drones to prepare attack on Iran, sources say
Bleeping Computer reports:
North Korean hackers deepfake execs in Zoom call to spread Mac malware
Big Media
The Guardian reports:
The mainstream media has enabled Trump’s war on universities
BleepingComputer reports:
[Washington Post’s email system hacked, journalists’ accounts compromised]
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/washington-posts-email-system-hacked-journalists-accounts-compromised/Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting reports:
Working Hard to Justify Israel’s Unprovoked Attack on Iran
Big Media
Ars Technica reports:
OpenAI weighs “nuclear option” of antitrust complaint against Microsoft
How surprising. Two big tech c^nts can’t get along.
The Register reports:
Salesforce study finds LLM agents flunk CRM and confidentiality tests
‘AI is not doing its job and should leave us alone’ says Gartner’s top analyst
Absolutely.
noyb reports:
WhatsApp is getting ads using personal data from Instagram and Facebook
The Guardian reports:
(AI)‘It’s terrifying’: WhatsApp AI helper mistakenly shares user’s number
TechCrunch reports:
xAI is facing a lawsuit for operating over 400 MW of gas turbines without permits
Tumblr’s content-filtering systems have been falsely flagging posts as ‘mature,’ users blame AI
Instagram users complain of mass bans, pointing finger at AI
BleepingComputer reports:
Instagram ‘BMO’ ads use AI deepfakes to scam banking customers
BellingCat reports:
The BBC reports:
Is Google about to destroy the web?
Antitrust Intelligence reports:
Microsoft Could Repeat its Teams Strategy, this time with Bing and Edge
The Markup reports:
We caught 4 more states sharing personal health data with Big Tech
Big Tech
404 Media reports:
The People Search Sites in the Suspected Minnesota Killer’s Notebook Are a Failure of Congress
Cybersecurity/Privacy
Krebs on Security reports:
Inside a Dark Adtech Empire Fed by Fake CAPTCHAs
Fediverse
The Fediverse Report reports:
The W3C Community Group looks at:
Messaging Layer Security over ActivityPub
Timothy Chambers shares:
The Seven Deadly UX Sins of the Fediverse Web Experience (To Fix)
Mastodon has:
Mastodon is a digital public good
Emily McClue has a bone to pick with them:
New Terms of Service IP clause cannot be terminated or revoked, not even by deleting content
PeerTube announces:
App crowdfunding — Let’s go live!
Elena Rossini shares a valuable asset:
Ghost is:
Bonfire announces:
ActivityPub for WordPress announces:
New Look, Faster Blocks in ActivityPub 6.0.0
TechCrunch reports:
Mastodon updates its terms to prohibit AI model training
Threads is testing spoiler text, Zuckerberg says
Threads expands open social web integrations with fediverse feed, user profile search
Remember to block the instance, threads.net.
Other Slightly Federated Social Media
Tedium shares:
Again, none of this would matter if Bluesky were not a company trying to make money and in debt to VCs.
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#ActivityPub #AI #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Bluesky #Bonfire #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Ghost #Mastodon #Peertube #StopChina #StopIran #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism #Threads #WordPress
-
Destroying Autocracy – June 19, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
DA comes out on Thursday and is updated through the end of day on Friday. Then we start over. So take your time in perusing it and check back in over the weekend.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
Featured Item
404 Media reports:
AI Scraping Bots Are Breaking Open Libraries, Archives, and Museums
When you use AI, you contribute to this c^ntitry.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
Micah Flee explores:
Using Signal groups for activism
The Guardian reports:
Makers of air fryers and smart speakers told to respect users’ right to privacy
Spy ships, cyber-attacks and shadow fleets: the crack security team braced for trouble at sea
TechCrunch reports:
The ‘OpenAI Files’ push for oversight in the race to AGI
The Register reports:
LibreOffice adds voice to ‘ditch Windows for Linux’ campaign
Microsoft brings 365 suite on-prem as part of sovereign cloud push
France 24 reports:
‘We’re done with Teams’: German state hits uninstall on Microsoft
TechPolicy shares:
What the EU Needs to Do to Challenge Big Tech Cloud Dominance
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Apple to Australians: You’re Too Stupid to Choose Your Own Apps
BleepingComputer reports:
Police seizes Archetyp Market drug marketplace, arrests admin
The Register reviews:
/e/ OS 3.0: Slightly less clunky, slightly more private
Neutral
The Register reports:
The launch of ChatGPT polluted the world forever, like the first atomic weapons tests
Euronews reports:
Dutch online platform watchdog struggling to connect with other EU member states
The Register reports:
MiniMax M1 model claims Chinese LLM crown from DeepSeek – plus it’s true open-source
Dems hyperventilate about Palantir’s work with the IRS in letter to CEO Karp
I would trust Palantir as far as I could kick their CEO.
The Evil Empire Strikes Back
404 Media reports:
Emails Reveal the Casual Surveillance Alliance Between ICE and Local Police
California Cops Investigate ‘Immigration Protest’ With AI-Camera System
The Kyiv Independent reports:
Open Rights Group reports:
Police forces to get authoritarian powers to extract data from online accounts
Pariah States
DarkReading reports:
‘HoldingHands’ Acts Like a Pickpocket With Taiwan Orgs
Paragon Commercial Spyware Infects Prominent Journalists
The Register reports:
Amazon CISO: Iranian hacking crews ‘on high alert’ since Israel attack
404 Media reports:
The AI Slop Fight Between Iran and Israel
EuroNews reports:
Israel’s spy agency used AI and smuggled-in drones to prepare attack on Iran, sources say
Bleeping Computer reports:
North Korean hackers deepfake execs in Zoom call to spread Mac malware
Big Media
The Guardian reports:
The mainstream media has enabled Trump’s war on universities
BleepingComputer reports:
[Washington Post’s email system hacked, journalists’ accounts compromised]
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/washington-posts-email-system-hacked-journalists-accounts-compromised/Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting reports:
Working Hard to Justify Israel’s Unprovoked Attack on Iran
Big Media
Ars Technica reports:
OpenAI weighs “nuclear option” of antitrust complaint against Microsoft
How surprising. Two big tech c^nts can’t get along.
The Register reports:
Salesforce study finds LLM agents flunk CRM and confidentiality tests
‘AI is not doing its job and should leave us alone’ says Gartner’s top analyst
Absolutely.
noyb reports:
WhatsApp is getting ads using personal data from Instagram and Facebook
The Guardian reports:
(AI)‘It’s terrifying’: WhatsApp AI helper mistakenly shares user’s number
TechCrunch reports:
xAI is facing a lawsuit for operating over 400 MW of gas turbines without permits
Tumblr’s content-filtering systems have been falsely flagging posts as ‘mature,’ users blame AI
Instagram users complain of mass bans, pointing finger at AI
BleepingComputer reports:
Instagram ‘BMO’ ads use AI deepfakes to scam banking customers
BellingCat reports:
The BBC reports:
Is Google about to destroy the web?
Antitrust Intelligence reports:
Microsoft Could Repeat its Teams Strategy, this time with Bing and Edge
The Markup reports:
We caught 4 more states sharing personal health data with Big Tech
Big Tech
404 Media reports:
The People Search Sites in the Suspected Minnesota Killer’s Notebook Are a Failure of Congress
Cybersecurity/Privacy
Krebs on Security reports:
Inside a Dark Adtech Empire Fed by Fake CAPTCHAs
Fediverse
The Fediverse Report reports:
The W3C Community Group looks at:
Messaging Layer Security over ActivityPub
Timothy Chambers shares:
The Seven Deadly UX Sins of the Fediverse Web Experience (To Fix)
Mastodon has:
Mastodon is a digital public good
Emily McClue has a bone to pick with them:
New Terms of Service IP clause cannot be terminated or revoked, not even by deleting content
PeerTube announces:
App crowdfunding — Let’s go live!
Elena Rossini shares a valuable asset:
Ghost is:
Bonfire announces:
ActivityPub for WordPress announces:
New Look, Faster Blocks in ActivityPub 6.0.0
TechCrunch reports:
Mastodon updates its terms to prohibit AI model training
Threads is testing spoiler text, Zuckerberg says
Threads expands open social web integrations with fediverse feed, user profile search
Remember to block the instance, threads.net.
Other Slightly Federated Social Media
Tedium shares:
Again, none of this would matter if Bluesky were not a company trying to make money and in debt to VCs.
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#ActivityPub #AI #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Bluesky #Bonfire #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Ghost #Mastodon #Peertube #StopChina #StopIran #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism #Threads #WordPress
-
Destroying Autocracy – June 19, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
DA comes out on Thursday and is updated through the end of day on Friday. Then we start over. So take your time in perusing it and check back in over the weekend.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
Featured Item
404 Media reports:
AI Scraping Bots Are Breaking Open Libraries, Archives, and Museums
When you use AI, you contribute to this c^ntitry.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
Micah Flee explores:
Using Signal groups for activism
The Guardian reports:
Makers of air fryers and smart speakers told to respect users’ right to privacy
Spy ships, cyber-attacks and shadow fleets: the crack security team braced for trouble at sea
TechCrunch reports:
The ‘OpenAI Files’ push for oversight in the race to AGI
The Register reports:
LibreOffice adds voice to ‘ditch Windows for Linux’ campaign
Microsoft brings 365 suite on-prem as part of sovereign cloud push
France 24 reports:
‘We’re done with Teams’: German state hits uninstall on Microsoft
TechPolicy shares:
What the EU Needs to Do to Challenge Big Tech Cloud Dominance
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Apple to Australians: You’re Too Stupid to Choose Your Own Apps
BleepingComputer reports:
Police seizes Archetyp Market drug marketplace, arrests admin
The Register reviews:
/e/ OS 3.0: Slightly less clunky, slightly more private
Vox reports:
He’s the godfather of AI. Now, he has a bold new plan to keep us safe from it.
Neutral
The Register reports:
The launch of ChatGPT polluted the world forever, like the first atomic weapons tests
Euronews reports:
Dutch online platform watchdog struggling to connect with other EU member states
The Register reports:
MiniMax M1 model claims Chinese LLM crown from DeepSeek – plus it’s true open-source
Dems hyperventilate about Palantir’s work with the IRS in letter to CEO Karp
I would trust Palantir as far as I could kick their CEO.
The Evil Empire Strikes Back
404 Media reports:
Emails Reveal the Casual Surveillance Alliance Between ICE and Local Police
California Cops Investigate ‘Immigration Protest’ With AI-Camera System
The Markup reports:
California police are illegally sharing license plate data with ICE and Border Patrol
The Kyiv Independent reports:
Open Rights Group reports:
Police forces to get authoritarian powers to extract data from online accounts
False alarm: fake news and the right fuel attack on NGOs
EuroNews reports:
Ukrainian journalists fear USAID cuts opened up space for Russian disinformation campaigns
Pariah States
DarkReading reports:
‘HoldingHands’ Acts Like a Pickpocket With Taiwan Orgs
Iran-Israel War Triggers a Maelstrom in Cyberspace
Paragon Commercial Spyware Infects Prominent Journalists
The Register reports:
Amazon CISO: Iranian hacking crews ‘on high alert’ since Israel attack
404 Media reports:
The AI Slop Fight Between Iran and Israel
EuroNews reports:
Israel’s spy agency used AI and smuggled-in drones to prepare attack on Iran, sources say
Bleeping Computer reports:
North Korean hackers deepfake execs in Zoom call to spread Mac malware
Telecom giant Viasat breached by China’s Salt Typhoon hackers
Citizen Lab reports:
Same Sea, New Phish: Russian Government-Linked Social Engineering Targets App-Specific Passwords
Big Media
The Guardian reports:
The mainstream media has enabled Trump’s war on universities
BleepingComputer reports:
Washington Post’s email system hacked, journalists’ accounts compromised
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting reports:
Working Hard to Justify Israel’s Unprovoked Attack on Iran
One Man and his Blog reports:
Digital News Report 2025: exponential media change is here
Big Tech
Ars Technica reports:
OpenAI weighs “nuclear option” of antitrust complaint against Microsoft
How surprising. Two big tech c^nts can’t get along.
The Register reports:
Salesforce study finds LLM agents flunk CRM and confidentiality tests
‘AI is not doing its job and should leave us alone’ says Gartner’s top analyst
Absolutely.
noyb reports:
WhatsApp is getting ads using personal data from Instagram and Facebook
The Guardian reports:
(AI)‘It’s terrifying’: WhatsApp AI helper mistakenly shares user’s number
TechCrunch reports:
xAI is facing a lawsuit for operating over 400 MW of gas turbines without permits
Tumblr’s content-filtering systems have been falsely flagging posts as ‘mature,’ users blame AI
Instagram users complain of mass bans, pointing finger at AI
BleepingComputer reports:
Instagram ‘BMO’ ads use AI deepfakes to scam banking customers
BellingCat reports:
Ludic Mataroa schools the AI Bros:
Contra Ptacek’s Terrible Article On AI
Wired reports:
How Much Energy Does AI Use? The People Who Know Aren’t Saying
The BBC reports:
Is Google about to destroy the web?
Antitrust Intelligence reports:
Microsoft Could Repeat its Teams Strategy, this time with Bing and Edge
The Markup reports:
We caught 4 more states sharing personal health data with Big Tech
Terror
404 Media reports:
The People Search Sites in the Suspected Minnesota Killer’s Notebook Are a Failure of Congress
Cybersecurity/Privacy
Krebs on Security reports:
Inside a Dark Adtech Empire Fed by Fake CAPTCHAs
The Register reports:
Sitecore CMS flaw let attackers brute-force ‘b’ for backdoor
Fuck corporate CMSs.
BleepingComputer reports:
DuckDuckGo beefs up scam defense to block fake stores, crypto sites
Fediverse
The Fediverse Report reports:
The W3C Community Group looks at:
Messaging Layer Security over ActivityPub
Timothy Chambers shares:
The Seven Deadly UX Sins of the Fediverse Web Experience (To Fix)
Mastodon has:
Mastodon is a digital public good
Emily McClue has a bone to pick with them:
New Terms of Service IP clause cannot be terminated or revoked, not even by deleting content
PeerTube announces:
App crowdfunding — Let’s go live!
Elena Rossini shares a valuable asset:
Ghost is:
Bonfire announces:
ActivityPub for WordPress announces:
New Look, Faster Blocks in ActivityPub 6.0.0
TechCrunch reports:
Mastodon updates its terms to prohibit AI model training
Threads is testing spoiler text, Zuckerberg says
Threads expands open social web integrations with fediverse feed, user profile search
Remember to block the instance, threads.net.
Other Slightly Federated Social Media
The Fediverse Report has:
Mathew Ingram says:
Reports of Bluesky’s death have been greatly exaggerated
Tedium shares:
Again, none of this would matter if Bluesky were not a company trying to make money and in debt to VCs.
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#121 #ActivityPub #AI #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Bluesky #Bonfire #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Ghost #Mastodon #Peertube #StopChina #StopIran #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism #Threads #WordPress
-
Doom_et_Al’s and Dear Hollow’s Top Ten(ish) of 2024
By Doom_et_Al
Doom_et_Al
2024 was the year my reviewing fell off a cliff.
I had plenty of good excuses. An infant son (Grayskull) who totally rocks my world but who gobbles up free time and good sleep habits like Pacman on a tear. A new role at the hospital, for which I was initially out of my depth, and that required enormous effort to stay afloat. An exhausting book tour for a memoir I published earlier this year. These are all incredible things for which I am extremely grateful. I just found that at the end of every day, when I should have been critically assessing music, all I wanted to do was sleep.
This significant reduction in free time has forced me to reassess my relationship with metal. In the beforetimes, I would inhale it. I was not picky; the more the merrier. Now, I have to be judicious with what I listen to. I have a lower tolerance for bad music, and less inclination to listen to it multiple times. I sometimes yearned for a time when I could focus on music I wanted to listen to, not music I was being asked to critique. This caused me to wonder if I had any business reviewing music at all.
I can’t tell you if 2024 was a good year for metal or not, because the free time I had was focused on music that brought comfort. I therefore spun fewer albums, but those I did spin got a lot of earball time. I do know that despite everything, metal continued to bring me enormous joy and happiness. Part of this is thanks to the incredible AMG team, and AMG Himself, who have created, without question, the best metal site on the planet. Special thanks to the Steely One, who could have fired me many times, but didn’t for some reason. I’d also like to thank my fellow writers who are good, kind, supportive people whose only flaw is their collective questionable taste.
Returning to the question of why I’m still here: a few weeks ago, I was playing Gaerea softly on the stereo. Grayskull crawled in, heard the music, stood up, and with the biggest grin on his face, began growling and gesticulating. He was loving it, and his unbridled joy reminded me of how glorious good metal can be. It inspired me to try to review more next year. I hope some of that rubs off on you and that you have a beautiful, prosperous and happy 2025
#10. Sgáile // Traverse the Bealach – This type of noodly prog isn’t usually my thing. But Sgáile’s Traverse the Bealach is so damn catchy and epic that it transcends the usual pitfalls of the sub-genre. Importantly, it captures the essence and majesty of the Scottish Highlands (albeit in post-apocalyptic form) in a way matched only, perhaps, by countryman Saor. It’s also an album that improves the longer you listen to it. An unexpected delight.
#9. Misotheist // Vessels by Which the Devil is Made Flesh – A band that hasn’t forgotten that black metal is supposed to feel ugly and dangerous, Vessels picks up where For the Glory of Your Redeemer left off, and is just as remorseless, claustrophobic and scary as its predecessors. Misotheist do their usual thing and knock out 3 dissonant bangers in under 40 minutes. When people complain that black metal has gone soft, point them in the direction of Misotheist
#8. Dissimulator // Lower Form Resistance – Thrash so tasty, even non-thrash fans like myself had to take notice. Complex, technical, ferocious… the only thing I don’t love is the vocals, and those I can get past because the rest is so good. Loaded with killer riffs from start to finish, this should appease the cave-man in you, while tickling those neurones as well. This one stayed in rotation for me all year. Thrash never does that. Which should tell you all you need to know.
#7. Spectral Wound // Songs of Blood and Mire – Although not as immediately spectacular as its predecessor, Songs of Blood and Mire is still a ferocious collection of vital and vivid black metal. Melding melodicism with fury, Spectral Wound create music as monstrous as it is catchy. Perhaps because it lacks the outright bangers of A Diabolic Thirst, perhaps because it is even more caustic, this one flew under many a radar. Don’t let it fly under yours.
#6. Kanonenfieber // Die Urkatastrophe – Building on the promise exhibited in earlier albums and EPs, Kanonenfieber realize their full potential with Die Urkatastrophe. So aggressive, so confident, so accomplished that I knew after one listen that it would list. The notion that “war is hell” is patently clichéd, yet Kanonenfieber subvert the usual trappings by cleverly mixing the faux-sunniness of war propaganda with the brutality of black metal. It works brilliantly.
#5. Selbst // Despondency Chord Progressions – Don’t let the hideous AI art turn you off. Selbst have come out of nowhere to create the year’s most chaotic, yet compelling, collection of tracks. Channelling Suffering Hour, this is music that finds the beauty in the messiness of its composition. Miraculously, the insanity never becomes wearying, only more interesting. By the time the final chords fade, you’ll want to throw yourself in all over again.
#4. Dawn Treader // Bloom & Decay – File under “surprise of the year.” I nearly snapped this one up from the promo sump, and then, like an idiot, passed it by. Joke’s on me. Capturing the warm, fuzzy side of black metal (a la Deafheaven, or a good version of Ghost Bath), Dawn Treader manages to pack a deep emotional punch despite all the prettiness on display. Alcest’s effort this year was fine… but when I wanted that transcendent experience only good black metal can provide, it was to Bloom & Decay that I kept returning.
#3. Gaerea // Coma – Gaerea have always been absolute masters of catharsis. The ability to take music that is baseline intense, and ratchet it up even further, is a rare gift. With Coma, Gaerea dial things back. Their tenderest, most intimate collection benefits from adding a gentler emotional core. This makes Coma less immediate than, say, Mirage,but ultimately more varied. And when it hits, the highs are some of the best of Gaerea’s rock-solid career.
#2. Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God – Arguably the best band in metal release another absolute barnstormer. Using every trick learned over the previous albums, Ulcerate deploy a devastating assault of dissonant death metal that captivates as it overwhelms. Insane drumming, complex time shifts, forceful melodies, thematic cohesion… Cutting the Throat of God has it all.
#1. Iotunnn // Kinship – First things first. Kinship not Access All Worlds Part 2. It’s more ambitious. It’s more sprawling. It’s shaggier and looser. And truthfully, on my first few listens, I thought it was a bit bloated and ill-disciplined. A 4.5 hiding in a 3.0, if you will. But a weird thing happened. I kept coming back. And every time I came back, I discovered something new. The incredible cymbal work on the chorus of “Mistland,” the gorgeous ending of “The Anguished Eternal.” Soon I realized Kinship, and its songs, are exactly as long as they need to be. Jon Aldara’s amazing vocal work elevates the stellar material even further, adding emotional complexity and yearning to the spell-binding complexity. The result is ethereal, complex, spiritually satisfying prog-death. It’s the best album of the year.
Disappointment o’ the Year:
Zeal & Ardor // Greif – I love the band. The live show still rocks. But this is a disappointing misfire.
Songs o’ the Year
- “Silver Leaves” – Wintersun
- “Mistland” – Iotunn
- “A Mercy Fall” – Counting Hours
- “Withering Flower” – Gaerea
- “Neuronal Fire” – Dark Tranquillity
- “Matricide 8:21” – Fleshgod Apocalypse
Dear Hollow
Welcome to the end of 2024! We at AMG hope the year has been kind to you – that your lives are filled with love, your hearts with joy, and our world with peace. I hope that you have found your people, and have those you can lean on. If we have ever given you a voice, a platform, or just love and support when you need it, then we have done our jobs.
2024 has been a roller coaster for the Hollow household. Our toddler is now a three-year-old encroaching on kidhood, with all the sass and sick burns she can muster.1 Fun news: we will be welcoming another kiddo into the world come summer of 2025! I also finally graduated with my master’s in secondary education this past year (mainly for the pay raise). While I’m unsure how much I will use from those classes, I have stepped up my class offerings to science fiction, true crime, and archaeology, alongside myriad others.
My metal reviewing has found a bit of a crossroads in 2024. At the end of 2023, I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression with potential ADHD, with a ton of childhood patterns and religious trauma rooted in my upbringing. As I unpack my need for productivity, I have had to take some steps back and see where my values actually lie as I’ve acclimated to medication, counseling, and just trying to rewire my brain. I’ve been reading and relaxing more, instead of cranking out reviews as religiously as I have. I’m trying to live without religion – of any kind.
Special shout-outs to those who have been instrumental in my journey this year: the ineffable and tireless Steel Druhm, the genre-confusing Dolphin Whisperer, and those who have been supportive all year (Thus Spoke, Maddog, Carcharadon, Holdeneye, and Mystikus Hugebeard). Couldn’t have done it without y’all.
On to the metal!
#ish. Sumac // The Healer – The amorphous and fluid nature of The Healer is exactly what I’ve wanted out of post-metal. Its organicity is its greatest asset, accomplishing rich and trembling tones across its mammoth 76-minute runtime. Improvised material largely fails due to its lack of direction, but direction was never a focus for Sumac; rather, it dwells in its own devastation – the warhead and the fallout. Electronics simmer, noise erupts, sludge riffs hit with the weight of a thousand suns, and vocals command the attack with vitriol and mania alike. The Healer wounds and heals.
#10. Sidewinder // Talon – I never thought a stoner-inclined album would make it to my list, but here we are. I scoffed, but then the first riff of “Guardians” hit, and collided with vocalist Jem Tupe’s formidable and rich belts, the pleasure was so immense I threw a table over. The full-bodied, fuzzed-out blues riffs continue into jam seshes that keep me coming back for more, with them bluesy vocals floating like a weed-piloted spaceship atop the seas of psychedelia. The New Zealand act boasts range, zeniths in the low and slow, and cuts loose with southern fried riffage. I haven’t been able to shake the riff from “Prisoner” for months.
#9. Sleepytime Gorilla Museum // Of the Last Human Being – As a recent convert to 2004’s Of Natural History, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum scratches the itch I didn’t know I had. In essence, an art rock and jazz foray, Of the Last Human Being goes from snappy blasts of UneXpect-style metal meltdowns, multilayered vocal attacks, wonky and hypnotizing dream sequences,2 to brass drawls, anachronistic industrial electronic, to art-funk, and more! Sleepytime Gorilla Museum is confidently locked into its own stylistic fluidity – Of the Last Being picks up as if seventeen years haven’t passed since its predecessor.
#8. Mamaleek // Vida Blue – Taking what made predecessor Diner Coffee so great and blowing it up with a palpable pomp, Vida Blue simultaneously pays homage to member Eric Livingston and the relocation of the Oakland Athletics to Las Vegas. Mamaleek establishes these tracks upon much shiftier sands, free jazz at its core, while jazz- and blues rock, post-punk, prog-rock, and pure experimentalisms are glossed over progressions rotten to the core. From flute and brass explosions to anarchic punk driving, you’d be hard-pressed to find an album as bewildering – and as utterly brilliant – as Vida Blue. Home run or whatever.
#7. Thou // Umbilical – While Thou has always been excellent, Umbilical foregoes the post-metal sensibilities that populated Heathen and Summit in favor of a cutthroat hardcore influence. Blessedly, while it feels harsher than much of their previous material, it doesn’t change the core that defines this Baton Rouge collective. Doom and sludge still dominate the pain and smothering that Umbilical represents, with the thick riffs reeking with the putridity of swamp water and vocals haunting with the vitriol of the bayou’s ghosts dominating the ears aplenty, with a vicious hardcore urgency biting through the humidity.
#6. Ataraxie // Le Déclin – The bleak edge of funeral doom has never felt so appealing. Recalling Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal in its audio and existential weight, the French collective balances the heft of funeral doom with the punishment of death metal – without the bells and whistles of modern atmospherics. Leads dominate the melodic portions with mobility and competence, death metal collapses regularly imminent, tension and bleakness hanging high in an empty sky. Four tracks of patient starkness greet the ears with overwhelming weight and tortured meditations on devastation.
#5. Ingurgitating Oblivion // Ontology of Nought – Easily my most returned-to album of 2024, the German duo creates a death metal album that embodies the outer extremes of the style. It’s dissonant beyond what many consider dissonant, punishing beyond what’s considered punishing, and easily one of the most exploratory albums of the year. Five long-form tracks showcase labyrinthine songwriting, experimental melodic structures, mind-flaying technicality, and a strange sense of catchiness radiating from deep within. Perhaps the most puzzling release of the year that requires and demands your full attention, the unearthed rewards are plenty.
#4. Orgone // Pleroma – Stephen Jarrett emerges from a ten-year hiatus of Orgone for a definitive piece of metal that defies explanation. Featuring a technicality that exists in a league of its own with an adventurousness and organicity that aligns its vast range of influences neatly, with its core landing somewhere among technical death metal and post-hardcore a la Amia Venera Landscape. Riffs and sweeps maintain a certain unhinged and intensely calculated tedium, while stylistic wilderness is explored in real-time. Post-metal, death metal, post-hardcore, and jazz are all tied together with crescendos and organic breadth that sway from lush harmony to scathing dissonance seamlessly. Orgone returns with an opus and pilgrimage of beauty, adventure, and pain.
#3. Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God – I was this close to writing off Ulcerate’s newest as too accessible and too forward, lacking the atmospheric prowess of The Destroyers of All or Stare Into Death and Be Still. Then I let Cutting the Throat of God whisper and breath. In between these stormy blusters came the answer, and a sentience emerged. It wasn’t about a broad showcase of dissonance and technical prowess, but a holistic cohesion that stitches the music together with the nuance and sinews of being. The vicious and the ethereal blended into unspoken horror, with meditations ranging from the frantic to the morbid. Cutting the Throat of God is the most human of its releases but in the tragedy it becomes and the metamorphosis it undergoes – the murder of God.
#2. Aborted // Vault of Horrors – I’ve never been terribly keen on the Belgian deathgrind legends, but Vault of Horrors curb-stomped a special place in me – namely because it sounds like deathcore. I’m not willing to banter about that specificity, but all I know is that Vault of Horrors kicks serious ass. Ripping tempos, bludgeoning riffs, and an unhinged technicality align for an album deserving of the act’s reputation, bolstered by a legion of guests.3 Highlight after highlight rolls by with reckless abandon and pulverizing intensity, until your body is so bruised and beaten you have nothing else to offer. I don’t care if it’s deathcore; it’s brutal, bouncy, and wicked, and I’m just happy to have my skull caved in.
#1. Convulsing // Perdurance – Thinking of the meteoric trajectory of Australian one-man project Convulsing and its albums, it’s no wonder that Perdurance has lasting success. Dissonant death metal has a high standard this year with established juggernauts Ulcerate, Gigan, Mitochondrion, Devenial Verdict, Pyrrhon, Replicant, and Ingurgitating Oblivion releasing scathing blight upon the world in monolithic and ruthless fashion. In this way, Perdurance takes the world in a whisper. Encapsulating a sound that is both unforgivingly dense and painfully claustrophobic, while also starkly and lushly atmospheric in its layered crescendos and exploratory songwriting, few artists profess the level of songwriting the way sole member Brendan Sloan utilizes: intricate and gradual evolution of riffs and melodies, achieving a level of organicity and sentience seen by few. Twisting convention with a knife firmly planted in devastation, Perdurance achieves a truly iconic and transcendent voice in the best album of the year.
Honorable Mentions:
- Paysage d’Hiver // Die Berge – It might not best Im Wald, but it’s a damn good conclusion to the Wanderer’s journeys, scathing black metal and frigid ambiance conjuring the majesty of mountains.
- Stenched // Purulence Gushing from the Coffin – I’ve never quite gotten what Steel Druhm has been on about with filthy, putrid death metal, but now I get it. Ugh, I need to take a shower.
- Defeated Sanity // Chronicles of Lunacy – Brutal death metal darlings don’t hesitate to bring the ouchy, but armed with enough technicality and insanity to keep us guessing, it’s a tough album to beat.
- Apes // Penitence – What appeared to be a total Nails ripoff turned out to be a much more atmospheric and thoughtful affair, the Quebecois group still managing to cave my skull in.
- Pillar of Light // Caldera – With a pulverizing yet restrained palette aimed at evocation through sludge and post-metal, this Detroit collective scratches the itch that only Amenra could have.
- Charli XCX // Brat – Well, color me Brat green and call me 2012 The Hobbit’s portrayal of the Misty Mountains. It’s a pop album that caught me by surprise. Hooks and experimental sensibilities align with a deceptively bare-bones album with a strong and palpable theme coursing through. I have not been able to get “Sympathy is a Knife” out of my head.
Biggest Surprises:
- Everyone and their Kitchen Sink // La Suspendida – What. The. Fuck.
- Jeris Johnson // Dragonborn – “Siren’s Song” is a perfect holiday track, as it interpolates the central melody of “What Child is This?”!!! Merry fucking Christmas. God.
- Two La Torture des Ténèbres albums in one year – I like it raw, boys.
- Three Monolith records in one year: blackened hardcore, doom/deathcore, and aquatic atmoblack. Impressive, fellas.
- How crucial darkwave bands Lazerpunk, Perturbator, and Sleepless Droids were to finishing my master’s. Thanks for the recommendations, Mystikus!
Songs o’ the Year:
- Assemble the Chariots – “Evermurk”
- Firtan – “Hrenga”
- Melvins – “Pain Equals Funny”
- Shiverboard – “Vitamins of Darkness”
- Convulsing – “Endurance”
- Charli XCX – “Sympathy is a Knife”
#2024 #Aborted #Apes #Ataraxie #CharliXCX #Convulsing #DawnTreader #DefeatedSanity #Dissimulator #DoomEtAlSAndDearHollowSTopTenIshOf2024 #Gaerea #IngurgitatingOblivion #Iotunn #Kanonenfieber #Mamaleek #Misotheist #Orgone #PaysageDHiver #PillarOfLight #Selbst #Sgaile #Sidewinder #SleepytimeGorillaMuseum #SpectralWound #Stenched #Sumac #Thou #Ulcerate #ZealAndArdor
-
Doom_et_Al’s and Dear Hollow’s Top Ten(ish) of 2024
By Doom_et_Al
Doom_et_Al
2024 was the year my reviewing fell off a cliff.
I had plenty of good excuses. An infant son (Grayskull) who totally rocks my world but who gobbles up free time and good sleep habits like Pacman on a tear. A new role at the hospital, for which I was initially out of my depth, and that required enormous effort to stay afloat. An exhausting book tour for a memoir I published earlier this year. These are all incredible things for which I am extremely grateful. I just found that at the end of every day, when I should have been critically assessing music, all I wanted to do was sleep.
This significant reduction in free time has forced me to reassess my relationship with metal. In the beforetimes, I would inhale it. I was not picky; the more the merrier. Now, I have to be judicious with what I listen to. I have a lower tolerance for bad music, and less inclination to listen to it multiple times. I sometimes yearned for a time when I could focus on music I wanted to listen to, not music I was being asked to critique. This caused me to wonder if I had any business reviewing music at all.
I can’t tell you if 2024 was a good year for metal or not, because the free time I had was focused on music that brought comfort. I therefore spun fewer albums, but those I did spin got a lot of earball time. I do know that despite everything, metal continued to bring me enormous joy and happiness. Part of this is thanks to the incredible AMG team, and AMG Himself, who have created, without question, the best metal site on the planet. Special thanks to the Steely One, who could have fired me many times, but didn’t for some reason. I’d also like to thank my fellow writers who are good, kind, supportive people whose only flaw is their collective questionable taste.
Returning to the question of why I’m still here: a few weeks ago, I was playing Gaerea softly on the stereo. Grayskull crawled in, heard the music, stood up, and with the biggest grin on his face, began growling and gesticulating. He was loving it, and his unbridled joy reminded me of how glorious good metal can be. It inspired me to try to review more next year. I hope some of that rubs off on you and that you have a beautiful, prosperous and happy 2025
#10. Sgáile // Traverse the Bealach – This type of noodly prog isn’t usually my thing. But Sgáile’s Traverse the Bealach is so damn catchy and epic that it transcends the usual pitfalls of the sub-genre. Importantly, it captures the essence and majesty of the Scottish Highlands (albeit in post-apocalyptic form) in a way matched only, perhaps, by countryman Saor. It’s also an album that improves the longer you listen to it. An unexpected delight.
#9. Misotheist // Vessels by Which the Devil is Made Flesh – A band that hasn’t forgotten that black metal is supposed to feel ugly and dangerous, Vessels picks up where For the Glory of Your Redeemer left off, and is just as remorseless, claustrophobic and scary as its predecessors. Misotheist do their usual thing and knock out 3 dissonant bangers in under 40 minutes. When people complain that black metal has gone soft, point them in the direction of Misotheist
#8. Dissimulator // Lower Form Resistance – Thrash so tasty, even non-thrash fans like myself had to take notice. Complex, technical, ferocious… the only thing I don’t love is the vocals, and those I can get past because the rest is so good. Loaded with killer riffs from start to finish, this should appease the cave-man in you, while tickling those neurones as well. This one stayed in rotation for me all year. Thrash never does that. Which should tell you all you need to know.
#7. Spectral Wound // Songs of Blood and Mire – Although not as immediately spectacular as its predecessor, Songs of Blood and Mire is still a ferocious collection of vital and vivid black metal. Melding melodicism with fury, Spectral Wound create music as monstrous as it is catchy. Perhaps because it lacks the outright bangers of A Diabolic Thirst, perhaps because it is even more caustic, this one flew under many a radar. Don’t let it fly under yours.
#6. Kanonenfieber // Die Urkatastrophe – Building on the promise exhibited in earlier albums and EPs, Kanonenfieber realize their full potential with Die Urkatastrophe. So aggressive, so confident, so accomplished that I knew after one listen that it would list. The notion that “war is hell” is patently clichéd, yet Kanonenfieber subvert the usual trappings by cleverly mixing the faux-sunniness of war propaganda with the brutality of black metal. It works brilliantly.
#5. Selbst // Despondency Chord Progressions – Don’t let the hideous AI art turn you off. Selbst have come out of nowhere to create the year’s most chaotic, yet compelling, collection of tracks. Channelling Suffering Hour, this is music that finds the beauty in the messiness of its composition. Miraculously, the insanity never becomes wearying, only more interesting. By the time the final chords fade, you’ll want to throw yourself in all over again.
#4. Dawn Treader // Bloom & Decay – File under “surprise of the year.” I nearly snapped this one up from the promo sump, and then, like an idiot, passed it by. Joke’s on me. Capturing the warm, fuzzy side of black metal (a la Deafheaven, or a good version of Ghost Bath), Dawn Treader manages to pack a deep emotional punch despite all the prettiness on display. Alcest’s effort this year was fine… but when I wanted that transcendent experience only good black metal can provide, it was to Bloom & Decay that I kept returning.
#3. Gaerea // Coma – Gaerea have always been absolute masters of catharsis. The ability to take music that is baseline intense, and ratchet it up even further, is a rare gift. With Coma, Gaerea dial things back. Their tenderest, most intimate collection benefits from adding a gentler emotional core. This makes Coma less immediate than, say, Mirage,but ultimately more varied. And when it hits, the highs are some of the best of Gaerea’s rock-solid career.
#2. Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God – Arguably the best band in metal release another absolute barnstormer. Using every trick learned over the previous albums, Ulcerate deploy a devastating assault of dissonant death metal that captivates as it overwhelms. Insane drumming, complex time shifts, forceful melodies, thematic cohesion… Cutting the Throat of God has it all.
#1. Iotunnn // Kinship – First things first. Kinship not Access All Worlds Part 2. It’s more ambitious. It’s more sprawling. It’s shaggier and looser. And truthfully, on my first few listens, I thought it was a bit bloated and ill-disciplined. A 4.5 hiding in a 3.0, if you will. But a weird thing happened. I kept coming back. And every time I came back, I discovered something new. The incredible cymbal work on the chorus of “Mistland,” the gorgeous ending of “The Anguished Eternal.” Soon I realized Kinship, and its songs, are exactly as long as they need to be. Jon Aldara’s amazing vocal work elevates the stellar material even further, adding emotional complexity and yearning to the spell-binding complexity. The result is ethereal, complex, spiritually satisfying prog-death. It’s the best album of the year.
Disappointment o’ the Year:
Zeal & Ardor // Greif – I love the band. The live show still rocks. But this is a disappointing misfire.
Songs o’ the Year
- “Silver Leaves” – Wintersun
- “Mistland” – Iotunn
- “A Mercy Fall” – Counting Hours
- “Withering Flower” – Gaerea
- “Neuronal Fire” – Dark Tranquillity
- “Matricide 8:21” – Fleshgod Apocalypse
Dear Hollow
Welcome to the end of 2024! We at AMG hope the year has been kind to you – that your lives are filled with love, your hearts with joy, and our world with peace. I hope that you have found your people, and have those you can lean on. If we have ever given you a voice, a platform, or just love and support when you need it, then we have done our jobs.
2024 has been a roller coaster for the Hollow household. Our toddler is now a three-year-old encroaching on kidhood, with all the sass and sick burns she can muster.1 Fun news: we will be welcoming another kiddo into the world come summer of 2025! I also finally graduated with my master’s in secondary education this past year (mainly for the pay raise). While I’m unsure how much I will use from those classes, I have stepped up my class offerings to science fiction, true crime, and archaeology, alongside myriad others.
My metal reviewing has found a bit of a crossroads in 2024. At the end of 2023, I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression with potential ADHD, with a ton of childhood patterns and religious trauma rooted in my upbringing. As I unpack my need for productivity, I have had to take some steps back and see where my values actually lie as I’ve acclimated to medication, counseling, and just trying to rewire my brain. I’ve been reading and relaxing more, instead of cranking out reviews as religiously as I have. I’m trying to live without religion – of any kind.
Special shout-outs to those who have been instrumental in my journey this year: the ineffable and tireless Steel Druhm, the genre-confusing Dolphin Whisperer, and those who have been supportive all year (Thus Spoke, Maddog, Carcharadon, Holdeneye, and Mystikus Hugebeard). Couldn’t have done it without y’all.
On to the metal!
#ish. Sumac // The Healer – The amorphous and fluid nature of The Healer is exactly what I’ve wanted out of post-metal. Its organicity is its greatest asset, accomplishing rich and trembling tones across its mammoth 76-minute runtime. Improvised material largely fails due to its lack of direction, but direction was never a focus for Sumac; rather, it dwells in its own devastation – the warhead and the fallout. Electronics simmer, noise erupts, sludge riffs hit with the weight of a thousand suns, and vocals command the attack with vitriol and mania alike. The Healer wounds and heals.
#10. Sidewinder // Talon – I never thought a stoner-inclined album would make it to my list, but here we are. I scoffed, but then the first riff of “Guardians” hit, and collided with vocalist Jem Tupe’s formidable and rich belts, the pleasure was so immense I threw a table over. The full-bodied, fuzzed-out blues riffs continue into jam seshes that keep me coming back for more, with them bluesy vocals floating like a weed-piloted spaceship atop the seas of psychedelia. The New Zealand act boasts range, zeniths in the low and slow, and cuts loose with southern fried riffage. I haven’t been able to shake the riff from “Prisoner” for months.
#9. Sleepytime Gorilla Museum // Of the Last Human Being – As a recent convert to 2004’s Of Natural History, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum scratches the itch I didn’t know I had. In essence, an art rock and jazz foray, Of the Last Human Being goes from snappy blasts of UneXpect-style metal meltdowns, multilayered vocal attacks, wonky and hypnotizing dream sequences,2 to brass drawls, anachronistic industrial electronic, to art-funk, and more! Sleepytime Gorilla Museum is confidently locked into its own stylistic fluidity – Of the Last Being picks up as if seventeen years haven’t passed since its predecessor.
#8. Mamaleek // Vida Blue – Taking what made predecessor Diner Coffee so great and blowing it up with a palpable pomp, Vida Blue simultaneously pays homage to member Eric Livingston and the relocation of the Oakland Athletics to Las Vegas. Mamaleek establishes these tracks upon much shiftier sands, free jazz at its core, while jazz- and blues rock, post-punk, prog-rock, and pure experimentalisms are glossed over progressions rotten to the core. From flute and brass explosions to anarchic punk driving, you’d be hard-pressed to find an album as bewildering – and as utterly brilliant – as Vida Blue. Home run or whatever.
#7. Thou // Umbilical – While Thou has always been excellent, Umbilical foregoes the post-metal sensibilities that populated Heathen and Summit in favor of a cutthroat hardcore influence. Blessedly, while it feels harsher than much of their previous material, it doesn’t change the core that defines this Baton Rouge collective. Doom and sludge still dominate the pain and smothering that Umbilical represents, with the thick riffs reeking with the putridity of swamp water and vocals haunting with the vitriol of the bayou’s ghosts dominating the ears aplenty, with a vicious hardcore urgency biting through the humidity.
#6. Ataraxie // Le Déclin – The bleak edge of funeral doom has never felt so appealing. Recalling Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal in its audio and existential weight, the French collective balances the heft of funeral doom with the punishment of death metal – without the bells and whistles of modern atmospherics. Leads dominate the melodic portions with mobility and competence, death metal collapses regularly imminent, tension and bleakness hanging high in an empty sky. Four tracks of patient starkness greet the ears with overwhelming weight and tortured meditations on devastation.
#5. Ingurgitating Oblivion // Ontology of Nought – Easily my most returned-to album of 2024, the German duo creates a death metal album that embodies the outer extremes of the style. It’s dissonant beyond what many consider dissonant, punishing beyond what’s considered punishing, and easily one of the most exploratory albums of the year. Five long-form tracks showcase labyrinthine songwriting, experimental melodic structures, mind-flaying technicality, and a strange sense of catchiness radiating from deep within. Perhaps the most puzzling release of the year that requires and demands your full attention, the unearthed rewards are plenty.
#4. Orgone // Pleroma – Stephen Jarrett emerges from a ten-year hiatus of Orgone for a definitive piece of metal that defies explanation. Featuring a technicality that exists in a league of its own with an adventurousness and organicity that aligns its vast range of influences neatly, with its core landing somewhere among technical death metal and post-hardcore a la Amia Venera Landscape. Riffs and sweeps maintain a certain unhinged and intensely calculated tedium, while stylistic wilderness is explored in real-time. Post-metal, death metal, post-hardcore, and jazz are all tied together with crescendos and organic breadth that sway from lush harmony to scathing dissonance seamlessly. Orgone returns with an opus and pilgrimage of beauty, adventure, and pain.
#3. Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God – I was this close to writing off Ulcerate’s newest as too accessible and too forward, lacking the atmospheric prowess of The Destroyers of All or Stare Into Death and Be Still. Then I let Cutting the Throat of God whisper and breath. In between these stormy blusters came the answer, and a sentience emerged. It wasn’t about a broad showcase of dissonance and technical prowess, but a holistic cohesion that stitches the music together with the nuance and sinews of being. The vicious and the ethereal blended into unspoken horror, with meditations ranging from the frantic to the morbid. Cutting the Throat of God is the most human of its releases but in the tragedy it becomes and the metamorphosis it undergoes – the murder of God.
#2. Aborted // Vault of Horrors – I’ve never been terribly keen on the Belgian deathgrind legends, but Vault of Horrors curb-stomped a special place in me – namely because it sounds like deathcore. I’m not willing to banter about that specificity, but all I know is that Vault of Horrors kicks serious ass. Ripping tempos, bludgeoning riffs, and an unhinged technicality align for an album deserving of the act’s reputation, bolstered by a legion of guests.3 Highlight after highlight rolls by with reckless abandon and pulverizing intensity, until your body is so bruised and beaten you have nothing else to offer. I don’t care if it’s deathcore; it’s brutal, bouncy, and wicked, and I’m just happy to have my skull caved in.
#1. Convulsing // Perdurance – Thinking of the meteoric trajectory of Australian one-man project Convulsing and its albums, it’s no wonder that Perdurance has lasting success. Dissonant death metal has a high standard this year with established juggernauts Ulcerate, Gigan, Mitochondrion, Devenial Verdict, Pyrrhon, Replicant, and Ingurgitating Oblivion releasing scathing blight upon the world in monolithic and ruthless fashion. In this way, Perdurance takes the world in a whisper. Encapsulating a sound that is both unforgivingly dense and painfully claustrophobic, while also starkly and lushly atmospheric in its layered crescendos and exploratory songwriting, few artists profess the level of songwriting the way sole member Brendan Sloan utilizes: intricate and gradual evolution of riffs and melodies, achieving a level of organicity and sentience seen by few. Twisting convention with a knife firmly planted in devastation, Perdurance achieves a truly iconic and transcendent voice in the best album of the year.
Honorable Mentions:
- Paysage d’Hiver // Die Berge – It might not best Im Wald, but it’s a damn good conclusion to the Wanderer’s journeys, scathing black metal and frigid ambiance conjuring the majesty of mountains.
- Stenched // Purulence Gushing from the Coffin – I’ve never quite gotten what Steel Druhm has been on about with filthy, putrid death metal, but now I get it. Ugh, I need to take a shower.
- Defeated Sanity // Chronicles of Lunacy – Brutal death metal darlings don’t hesitate to bring the ouchy, but armed with enough technicality and insanity to keep us guessing, it’s a tough album to beat.
- Apes // Penitence – What appeared to be a total Nails ripoff turned out to be a much more atmospheric and thoughtful affair, the Quebecois group still managing to cave my skull in.
- Pillar of Light // Caldera – With a pulverizing yet restrained palette aimed at evocation through sludge and post-metal, this Detroit collective scratches the itch that only Amenra could have.
- Charli XCX // Brat – Well, color me Brat green and call me 2012 The Hobbit’s portrayal of the Misty Mountains. It’s a pop album that caught me by surprise. Hooks and experimental sensibilities align with a deceptively bare-bones album with a strong and palpable theme coursing through. I have not been able to get “Sympathy is a Knife” out of my head.
Biggest Surprises:
- Everyone and their Kitchen Sink // La Suspendida – What. The. Fuck.
- Jeris Johnson // Dragonborn – “Siren’s Song” is a perfect holiday track, as it interpolates the central melody of “What Child is This?”!!! Merry fucking Christmas. God.
- Two La Torture des Ténèbres albums in one year – I like it raw, boys.
- Three Monolith records in one year: blackened hardcore, doom/deathcore, and aquatic atmoblack. Impressive, fellas.
- How crucial darkwave bands Lazerpunk, Perturbator, and Sleepless Droids were to finishing my master’s. Thanks for the recommendations, Mystikus!
Songs o’ the Year:
- Assemble the Chariots – “Evermurk”
- Firtan – “Hrenga”
- Melvins – “Pain Equals Funny”
- Shiverboard – “Vitamins of Darkness”
- Convulsing – “Endurance”
- Charli XCX – “Sympathy is a Knife”
#2024 #Aborted #Apes #Ataraxie #CharliXCX #Convulsing #DawnTreader #DefeatedSanity #Dissimulator #DoomEtAlSAndDearHollowSTopTenIshOf2024 #Gaerea #IngurgitatingOblivion #Iotunn #Kanonenfieber #Mamaleek #Misotheist #Orgone #PaysageDHiver #PillarOfLight #Selbst #Sgaile #Sidewinder #SleepytimeGorillaMuseum #SpectralWound #Stenched #Sumac #Thou #Ulcerate #ZealAndArdor
-
Doom_et_Al’s and Dear Hollow’s Top Ten(ish) of 2024
By Doom_et_Al
Doom_et_Al
2024 was the year my reviewing fell off a cliff.
I had plenty of good excuses. An infant son (Grayskull) who totally rocks my world but who gobbles up free time and good sleep habits like Pacman on a tear. A new role at the hospital, for which I was initially out of my depth, and that required enormous effort to stay afloat. An exhausting book tour for a memoir I published earlier this year. These are all incredible things for which I am extremely grateful. I just found that at the end of every day, when I should have been critically assessing music, all I wanted to do was sleep.
This significant reduction in free time has forced me to reassess my relationship with metal. In the beforetimes, I would inhale it. I was not picky; the more the merrier. Now, I have to be judicious with what I listen to. I have a lower tolerance for bad music, and less inclination to listen to it multiple times. I sometimes yearned for a time when I could focus on music I wanted to listen to, not music I was being asked to critique. This caused me to wonder if I had any business reviewing music at all.
I can’t tell you if 2024 was a good year for metal or not, because the free time I had was focused on music that brought comfort. I therefore spun fewer albums, but those I did spin got a lot of earball time. I do know that despite everything, metal continued to bring me enormous joy and happiness. Part of this is thanks to the incredible AMG team, and AMG Himself, who have created, without question, the best metal site on the planet. Special thanks to the Steely One, who could have fired me many times, but didn’t for some reason. I’d also like to thank my fellow writers who are good, kind, supportive people whose only flaw is their collective questionable taste.
Returning to the question of why I’m still here: a few weeks ago, I was playing Gaerea softly on the stereo. Grayskull crawled in, heard the music, stood up, and with the biggest grin on his face, began growling and gesticulating. He was loving it, and his unbridled joy reminded me of how glorious good metal can be. It inspired me to try to review more next year. I hope some of that rubs off on you and that you have a beautiful, prosperous and happy 2025
#10. Sgáile // Traverse the Bealach – This type of noodly prog isn’t usually my thing. But Sgáile’s Traverse the Bealach is so damn catchy and epic that it transcends the usual pitfalls of the sub-genre. Importantly, it captures the essence and majesty of the Scottish Highlands (albeit in post-apocalyptic form) in a way matched only, perhaps, by countryman Saor. It’s also an album that improves the longer you listen to it. An unexpected delight.
#9. Misotheist // Vessels by Which the Devil is Made Flesh – A band that hasn’t forgotten that black metal is supposed to feel ugly and dangerous, Vessels picks up where For the Glory of Your Redeemer left off, and is just as remorseless, claustrophobic and scary as its predecessors. Misotheist do their usual thing and knock out 3 dissonant bangers in under 40 minutes. When people complain that black metal has gone soft, point them in the direction of Misotheist
#8. Dissimulator // Lower Form Resistance – Thrash so tasty, even non-thrash fans like myself had to take notice. Complex, technical, ferocious… the only thing I don’t love is the vocals, and those I can get past because the rest is so good. Loaded with killer riffs from start to finish, this should appease the cave-man in you, while tickling those neurones as well. This one stayed in rotation for me all year. Thrash never does that. Which should tell you all you need to know.
#7. Spectral Wound // Songs of Blood and Mire – Although not as immediately spectacular as its predecessor, Songs of Blood and Mire is still a ferocious collection of vital and vivid black metal. Melding melodicism with fury, Spectral Wound create music as monstrous as it is catchy. Perhaps because it lacks the outright bangers of A Diabolic Thirst, perhaps because it is even more caustic, this one flew under many a radar. Don’t let it fly under yours.
#6. Kanonenfieber // Die Urkatastrophe – Building on the promise exhibited in earlier albums and EPs, Kanonenfieber realize their full potential with Die Urkatastrophe. So aggressive, so confident, so accomplished that I knew after one listen that it would list. The notion that “war is hell” is patently clichéd, yet Kanonenfieber subvert the usual trappings by cleverly mixing the faux-sunniness of war propaganda with the brutality of black metal. It works brilliantly.
#5. Selbst // Despondency Chord Progressions – Don’t let the hideous AI art turn you off. Selbst have come out of nowhere to create the year’s most chaotic, yet compelling, collection of tracks. Channelling Suffering Hour, this is music that finds the beauty in the messiness of its composition. Miraculously, the insanity never becomes wearying, only more interesting. By the time the final chords fade, you’ll want to throw yourself in all over again.
#4. Dawn Treader // Bloom & Decay – File under “surprise of the year.” I nearly snapped this one up from the promo sump, and then, like an idiot, passed it by. Joke’s on me. Capturing the warm, fuzzy side of black metal (a la Deafheaven, or a good version of Ghost Bath), Dawn Treader manages to pack a deep emotional punch despite all the prettiness on display. Alcest’s effort this year was fine… but when I wanted that transcendent experience only good black metal can provide, it was to Bloom & Decay that I kept returning.
#3. Gaerea // Coma – Gaerea have always been absolute masters of catharsis. The ability to take music that is baseline intense, and ratchet it up even further, is a rare gift. With Coma, Gaerea dial things back. Their tenderest, most intimate collection benefits from adding a gentler emotional core. This makes Coma less immediate than, say, Mirage,but ultimately more varied. And when it hits, the highs are some of the best of Gaerea’s rock-solid career.
#2. Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God – Arguably the best band in metal release another absolute barnstormer. Using every trick learned over the previous albums, Ulcerate deploy a devastating assault of dissonant death metal that captivates as it overwhelms. Insane drumming, complex time shifts, forceful melodies, thematic cohesion… Cutting the Throat of God has it all.
#1. Iotunnn // Kinship – First things first. Kinship not Access All Worlds Part 2. It’s more ambitious. It’s more sprawling. It’s shaggier and looser. And truthfully, on my first few listens, I thought it was a bit bloated and ill-disciplined. A 4.5 hiding in a 3.0, if you will. But a weird thing happened. I kept coming back. And every time I came back, I discovered something new. The incredible cymbal work on the chorus of “Mistland,” the gorgeous ending of “The Anguished Eternal.” Soon I realized Kinship, and its songs, are exactly as long as they need to be. Jon Aldara’s amazing vocal work elevates the stellar material even further, adding emotional complexity and yearning to the spell-binding complexity. The result is ethereal, complex, spiritually satisfying prog-death. It’s the best album of the year.
Disappointment o’ the Year:
Zeal & Ardor // Greif – I love the band. The live show still rocks. But this is a disappointing misfire.
Songs o’ the Year
- “Silver Leaves” – Wintersun
- “Mistland” – Iotunn
- “A Mercy Fall” – Counting Hours
- “Withering Flower” – Gaerea
- “Neuronal Fire” – Dark Tranquillity
- “Matricide 8:21” – Fleshgod Apocalypse
Dear Hollow
Welcome to the end of 2024! We at AMG hope the year has been kind to you – that your lives are filled with love, your hearts with joy, and our world with peace. I hope that you have found your people, and have those you can lean on. If we have ever given you a voice, a platform, or just love and support when you need it, then we have done our jobs.
2024 has been a roller coaster for the Hollow household. Our toddler is now a three-year-old encroaching on kidhood, with all the sass and sick burns she can muster.1 Fun news: we will be welcoming another kiddo into the world come summer of 2025! I also finally graduated with my master’s in secondary education this past year (mainly for the pay raise). While I’m unsure how much I will use from those classes, I have stepped up my class offerings to science fiction, true crime, and archaeology, alongside myriad others.
My metal reviewing has found a bit of a crossroads in 2024. At the end of 2023, I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression with potential ADHD, with a ton of childhood patterns and religious trauma rooted in my upbringing. As I unpack my need for productivity, I have had to take some steps back and see where my values actually lie as I’ve acclimated to medication, counseling, and just trying to rewire my brain. I’ve been reading and relaxing more, instead of cranking out reviews as religiously as I have. I’m trying to live without religion – of any kind.
Special shout-outs to those who have been instrumental in my journey this year: the ineffable and tireless Steel Druhm, the genre-confusing Dolphin Whisperer, and those who have been supportive all year (Thus Spoke, Maddog, Carcharadon, Holdeneye, and Mystikus Hugebeard). Couldn’t have done it without y’all.
On to the metal!
#ish. Sumac // The Healer – The amorphous and fluid nature of The Healer is exactly what I’ve wanted out of post-metal. Its organicity is its greatest asset, accomplishing rich and trembling tones across its mammoth 76-minute runtime. Improvised material largely fails due to its lack of direction, but direction was never a focus for Sumac; rather, it dwells in its own devastation – the warhead and the fallout. Electronics simmer, noise erupts, sludge riffs hit with the weight of a thousand suns, and vocals command the attack with vitriol and mania alike. The Healer wounds and heals.
#10. Sidewinder // Talon – I never thought a stoner-inclined album would make it to my list, but here we are. I scoffed, but then the first riff of “Guardians” hit, and collided with vocalist Jem Tupe’s formidable and rich belts, the pleasure was so immense I threw a table over. The full-bodied, fuzzed-out blues riffs continue into jam seshes that keep me coming back for more, with them bluesy vocals floating like a weed-piloted spaceship atop the seas of psychedelia. The New Zealand act boasts range, zeniths in the low and slow, and cuts loose with southern fried riffage. I haven’t been able to shake the riff from “Prisoner” for months.
#9. Sleepytime Gorilla Museum // Of the Last Human Being – As a recent convert to 2004’s Of Natural History, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum scratches the itch I didn’t know I had. In essence, an art rock and jazz foray, Of the Last Human Being goes from snappy blasts of UneXpect-style metal meltdowns, multilayered vocal attacks, wonky and hypnotizing dream sequences,2 to brass drawls, anachronistic industrial electronic, to art-funk, and more! Sleepytime Gorilla Museum is confidently locked into its own stylistic fluidity – Of the Last Being picks up as if seventeen years haven’t passed since its predecessor.
#8. Mamaleek // Vida Blue – Taking what made predecessor Diner Coffee so great and blowing it up with a palpable pomp, Vida Blue simultaneously pays homage to member Eric Livingston and the relocation of the Oakland Athletics to Las Vegas. Mamaleek establishes these tracks upon much shiftier sands, free jazz at its core, while jazz- and blues rock, post-punk, prog-rock, and pure experimentalisms are glossed over progressions rotten to the core. From flute and brass explosions to anarchic punk driving, you’d be hard-pressed to find an album as bewildering – and as utterly brilliant – as Vida Blue. Home run or whatever.
#7. Thou // Umbilical – While Thou has always been excellent, Umbilical foregoes the post-metal sensibilities that populated Heathen and Summit in favor of a cutthroat hardcore influence. Blessedly, while it feels harsher than much of their previous material, it doesn’t change the core that defines this Baton Rouge collective. Doom and sludge still dominate the pain and smothering that Umbilical represents, with the thick riffs reeking with the putridity of swamp water and vocals haunting with the vitriol of the bayou’s ghosts dominating the ears aplenty, with a vicious hardcore urgency biting through the humidity.
#6. Ataraxie // Le Déclin – The bleak edge of funeral doom has never felt so appealing. Recalling Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal in its audio and existential weight, the French collective balances the heft of funeral doom with the punishment of death metal – without the bells and whistles of modern atmospherics. Leads dominate the melodic portions with mobility and competence, death metal collapses regularly imminent, tension and bleakness hanging high in an empty sky. Four tracks of patient starkness greet the ears with overwhelming weight and tortured meditations on devastation.
#5. Ingurgitating Oblivion // Ontology of Nought – Easily my most returned-to album of 2024, the German duo creates a death metal album that embodies the outer extremes of the style. It’s dissonant beyond what many consider dissonant, punishing beyond what’s considered punishing, and easily one of the most exploratory albums of the year. Five long-form tracks showcase labyrinthine songwriting, experimental melodic structures, mind-flaying technicality, and a strange sense of catchiness radiating from deep within. Perhaps the most puzzling release of the year that requires and demands your full attention, the unearthed rewards are plenty.
#4. Orgone // Pleroma – Stephen Jarrett emerges from a ten-year hiatus of Orgone for a definitive piece of metal that defies explanation. Featuring a technicality that exists in a league of its own with an adventurousness and organicity that aligns its vast range of influences neatly, with its core landing somewhere among technical death metal and post-hardcore a la Amia Venera Landscape. Riffs and sweeps maintain a certain unhinged and intensely calculated tedium, while stylistic wilderness is explored in real-time. Post-metal, death metal, post-hardcore, and jazz are all tied together with crescendos and organic breadth that sway from lush harmony to scathing dissonance seamlessly. Orgone returns with an opus and pilgrimage of beauty, adventure, and pain.
#3. Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God – I was this close to writing off Ulcerate’s newest as too accessible and too forward, lacking the atmospheric prowess of The Destroyers of All or Stare Into Death and Be Still. Then I let Cutting the Throat of God whisper and breath. In between these stormy blusters came the answer, and a sentience emerged. It wasn’t about a broad showcase of dissonance and technical prowess, but a holistic cohesion that stitches the music together with the nuance and sinews of being. The vicious and the ethereal blended into unspoken horror, with meditations ranging from the frantic to the morbid. Cutting the Throat of God is the most human of its releases but in the tragedy it becomes and the metamorphosis it undergoes – the murder of God.
#2. Aborted // Vault of Horrors – I’ve never been terribly keen on the Belgian deathgrind legends, but Vault of Horrors curb-stomped a special place in me – namely because it sounds like deathcore. I’m not willing to banter about that specificity, but all I know is that Vault of Horrors kicks serious ass. Ripping tempos, bludgeoning riffs, and an unhinged technicality align for an album deserving of the act’s reputation, bolstered by a legion of guests.3 Highlight after highlight rolls by with reckless abandon and pulverizing intensity, until your body is so bruised and beaten you have nothing else to offer. I don’t care if it’s deathcore; it’s brutal, bouncy, and wicked, and I’m just happy to have my skull caved in.
#1. Convulsing // Perdurance – Thinking of the meteoric trajectory of Australian one-man project Convulsing and its albums, it’s no wonder that Perdurance has lasting success. Dissonant death metal has a high standard this year with established juggernauts Ulcerate, Gigan, Mitochondrion, Devenial Verdict, Pyrrhon, Replicant, and Ingurgitating Oblivion releasing scathing blight upon the world in monolithic and ruthless fashion. In this way, Perdurance takes the world in a whisper. Encapsulating a sound that is both unforgivingly dense and painfully claustrophobic, while also starkly and lushly atmospheric in its layered crescendos and exploratory songwriting, few artists profess the level of songwriting the way sole member Brendan Sloan utilizes: intricate and gradual evolution of riffs and melodies, achieving a level of organicity and sentience seen by few. Twisting convention with a knife firmly planted in devastation, Perdurance achieves a truly iconic and transcendent voice in the best album of the year.
Honorable Mentions:
- Paysage d’Hiver // Die Berge – It might not best Im Wald, but it’s a damn good conclusion to the Wanderer’s journeys, scathing black metal and frigid ambiance conjuring the majesty of mountains.
- Stenched // Purulence Gushing from the Coffin – I’ve never quite gotten what Steel Druhm has been on about with filthy, putrid death metal, but now I get it. Ugh, I need to take a shower.
- Defeated Sanity // Chronicles of Lunacy – Brutal death metal darlings don’t hesitate to bring the ouchy, but armed with enough technicality and insanity to keep us guessing, it’s a tough album to beat.
- Apes // Penitence – What appeared to be a total Nails ripoff turned out to be a much more atmospheric and thoughtful affair, the Quebecois group still managing to cave my skull in.
- Pillar of Light // Caldera – With a pulverizing yet restrained palette aimed at evocation through sludge and post-metal, this Detroit collective scratches the itch that only Amenra could have.
- Charli XCX // Brat – Well, color me Brat green and call me 2012 The Hobbit’s portrayal of the Misty Mountains. It’s a pop album that caught me by surprise. Hooks and experimental sensibilities align with a deceptively bare-bones album with a strong and palpable theme coursing through. I have not been able to get “Sympathy is a Knife” out of my head.
Biggest Surprises:
- Everyone and their Kitchen Sink // La Suspendida – What. The. Fuck.
- Jeris Johnson // Dragonborn – “Siren’s Song” is a perfect holiday track, as it interpolates the central melody of “What Child is This?”!!! Merry fucking Christmas. God.
- Two La Torture des Ténèbres albums in one year – I like it raw, boys.
- Three Monolith records in one year: blackened hardcore, doom/deathcore, and aquatic atmoblack. Impressive, fellas.
- How crucial darkwave bands Lazerpunk, Perturbator, and Sleepless Droids were to finishing my master’s. Thanks for the recommendations, Mystikus!
Songs o’ the Year:
- Assemble the Chariots – “Evermurk”
- Firtan – “Hrenga”
- Melvins – “Pain Equals Funny”
- Shiverboard – “Vitamins of Darkness”
- Convulsing – “Endurance”
- Charli XCX – “Sympathy is a Knife”
#2024 #Aborted #Apes #Ataraxie #CharliXCX #Convulsing #DawnTreader #DefeatedSanity #Dissimulator #DoomEtAlSAndDearHollowSTopTenIshOf2024 #Gaerea #IngurgitatingOblivion #Iotunn #Kanonenfieber #Mamaleek #Misotheist #Orgone #PaysageDHiver #PillarOfLight #Selbst #Sgaile #Sidewinder #SleepytimeGorillaMuseum #SpectralWound #Stenched #Sumac #Thou #Ulcerate #ZealAndArdor