#the-body — Public Fediverse posts

In honor of 40 years of "Stand By Me" (and finally pivoting #LibrarKay away from an exclusive diet of Siamese cats and cozy mysteries...) #TheBody #StandByMe

English is fairly adequate for basic communication, but it falls short for niche communities. In the same way that skiers repurpose “powder” or “carve” and gamers repurpose “own” or “sweaty,” metal fans break and contort language to suit our needs. We talk about “filthy” guitar tones and “razor sharp” riffs, discuss “cavernous” production and “suffocating” weight, and use violent imagery—bleeding ears, caved in skulls—to denote quality. So when I read phrases like “slow, painful march,” “soporific1 dirge,” and “empty decades between chords” on the promo sheet for debut Dark Thoughts with Lights Out, I thought Cattle Hammer was just employing a little dialectical variance, speaking the lingo. Joke’s on me, though. They weren’t.

Based in Birmingham, UK, Cattle Hammer was formed by vocalist/guitarist Duncan Wilkins (Fukpig, Mistress) in 2023. He’s joined by I Cartwright on drums, J Wyles on guitar, and D Von Donovan on bass. Together, they mix a caustic brew of drone, doom, and sludge, but each track on Dark Thoughts with Lights Out has its own identity. “Gloomsower” leans stony, and Wilkins oscillates between deep roars and strangled croaks reminiscent of Weedeater. “Rotting” features short tremolos, although they don’t do much besides check the “blackened” box on the PR sheet. The ambient, noise-tinged intro to “Watchmen, Alone” caught my attention, but repetition of the vocal sample stunts its ability to build tension. Similarly, “Body Puzzle” ends on some interesting synths, but it’s a tough sell so late in the album. If you can’t tell, I’m really reaching for positives here, but there’s not a one that isn’t ultimately a disappointment.

Dark Thoughts With Lights Out by Cattle Hammer

Every time I thought Cattle Hammer might do something interesting or better texturize Dark Thoughts with Lights Out, they shrank from the occasion. The early lead guitar in “Gloomsower” is a bright change of pace amidst thick, doomy passages, but instead of playing a countermelody or variation on the theme or literally anything else, it just plays the same fucking riff in a higher register. This same-riff-different-instrument/key tactic is fairly common (“Rotting,” “Watchmen, Alone”). Organ (“Watchmen, Alone,” “Body Puzzle”) and piano (“Rotting”) make appearances, but fail to deliver anything justifying their inclusion. Static and feedback crop up frequently, but in Cattle Hammer’s hands, they are merely unpleasant and banal. While I was intrigued by the first sample2 and always appreciate Sheri Moon Zombie,3 Cattle Hammer’s sample usage is ham-fisted and melodramatic. Each of these ornaments gave me hope that I might soon feel something besides boredom and frustration, but invariably, Dark Thoughts with Lights Out dashed my hopes and shuffled on.

What astounds me most on Dark Thoughts with Lights Out is how avoidable many of these blunders seem. Percussion is a little lackluster, and the instruments seem a bit compressed in the mix, leaving the vocals too far in front. These aren’t deal breakers, but playing fewer riffs—I’m being generous, calling them that—in 45 minutes than I have fingers is. Structuring the front half of a song to sound like a narrative climax with no build-up or release is (“Watchmen, Alone,” “Body Puzzle”). Rhythmic density rivaling the emptiness of space is. Ambient, feedback-laden outros enough to compile an EP is. This album is ostensibly meant to convey misery and suffering, but devoid of creativity or artistic abstraction, it misses the mark that acts like Primitive Man, The Body, or Sumac hit so well. It’s as if Cattle Hammer has crafted some misguided meta experience, in which the act of listening to the music imparts the misery normally communicated through the music itself.

If there’s one thing Cattle Hammer truly excels at, it’s squandering potential. Every criticism in this review is a place where I saw an opportunity for Dark Thoughts with Lights Out to get better, only for it to stay the course. What’s even more frustrating is that, if any one of these problems weren’t a problem, it could have at least partially salvaged the album. Amidst deeply uninteresting riffs played slow enough for inter-note naps, song constructions that fail to launch, underutilized instrumentation, an impressive lack of variation, repetition ad nauseum, and a totally unjustified runtime, Dark Thoughts with Lights Out isn’t simply unremarkable or uninteresting; it’s a literal chore to listen through. Based on the promo sheet, maybe that’s the point, but whether Cattle Hammer achieved their goal is irrelevant.4 Dark Thoughts with Lights Out is a bad album.

Rating: 1.0/5.0
DR: 10 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Road to Masochist
Websites: Bandcamp | Ampwall | Facebook | Instagram
Releases Worldwide: February 6th, 2026

🇺🇦 #NowPlaying on #BBC6Music's #StuartMaconiesFreakZone

The Body & Dis Fig:
🎵 Holy Lance

#TheBody #DisFig

https://audiotree.bandcamp.com/track/holy-lance

https://open.spotify.com/track/26K36XxXD0fuPtBfSAQToh

Netflix’s ‘The Body’ Adds 11 As Recurring
#Casting #Netflix #TheBody

https://deadline.com/2025/10/the-body-tv-series-quinn-shephard-adds-11-recurring-1236594864/

Heathe – Control Your Soul’s Desire For Freedom Review

By Samguineous Maximus

As I prowled the depths of the promo bin, preparing for my next review, a peculiar glint caught my eye. The label read, “RADIOACTIVE: FOR N00B ABUSE ONLY,” and below it, in what must have been an act of genre-tag terrorism, sat the words: nü metal/gospel/jazz. I briefly considered calling the authorities, but morbid curiosity won out. What kind of unholy chimera lurks inside something with that particular trifecta? I dusted off the cover like a bomb disposal tech, hoping the wires are color-coded. The culprit is Control Your Soul’s Desire For Freedom, the sophomore album from Danish group Heathe. The press blurb boasts “dissonance and endless repetition” alongside “depressive pop, live techno and pitch-black post-hardcore.” This project is either utterly revolutionary or catastrophically bad. Has Heathe somehow crafted an engaging 65-minute aural journey against all odds? Or will Control Your Soul’s Desire For Freedom see them disappear completely into the caverns of their own rectum?

As it turns out, the central sound on Control Your Soul’s Desire For Freedom isn’t quite as mind-boggling as it might seem. I’d place Heathe in the same category as The Body or Swans—sonic provocateurs who rely on oppressive atmosphere in tandem with monotonous repetition while pulling liberally from various musical traditions to convey emotion, often at the cost of songwriting. There are indeed notes of nü metal, gospel, and jazz scattered throughout the album, but they don’t redefine Heathe’s core aesthetic. Instead, these elements serve to augment the central concept or thematic devices of each track. Control Your Soul’s Desire For Freedom is clearly intended more as a listening “experience” meant to illicit powerful emotions than a collection of songs for consumptive pleasure. Each of the 6 tracks offers a different flavor of existential dread, ranging from harsh industrial loops accented by jazzy horns (“My Gods Destroy”) to Massive Attack-like triphop ethereal beats and autotuned choral vocals (“Uproar Taking Shape”). The only constants across them are a throat-shredding screamo wail, which makes up the majority of Heathe’s vocal delivery, 1 and an almost slavish devotion to repetition.

Each song is built on a distinct rhythmic or melodic idea, repeated ad nauseam throughout its runtime. To their credit, Heathe add nuance by carefully shaping the pacing and delivery of these repetitions. Opener “Black Milk Sour Soil” begins with a cappella screams that persist for several minutes before giving way to subtle synth rhythms, tribal drumming, and ominous group chanting. “Valencia’s Next” employs many of the same elements but builds them around a hypnotic central drum loop, adding and subtracting blasts of harsh noise alongside, yes, jazz flute. Individually, these tracks are compelling and texturally rich. Taken together, however, the elongated song lengths and the band’s preference for atmosphere over traditional song structure can make a full-album listen daunting. To their credit, Heathe place powerful climaxes at the end of several tracks, ecstatic post-rock crescendos where the horns and choirs break into consonance, but they aren’t enough to entice me back into repeated listens.

In many ways, Control Your Soul’s Desire For Freedom feels less like a conventional album and more like a performance art piece designed for a live audience. Heathe clearly understand how to convey emotional intensity, both uplifting and harrowing, and they wield that skill to striking effect. The final track, “Black As Oil,” is a gorgeous blend of modern classical and ambient, serving as a powerful yet bittersweet resolution after an album steeped in oppressive textures. As the strained vocals fade over shimmering guitar melodies, I’m hit with a wave of emotion—a kind of pained calmness. It’s the same sensation I might get from an avant-garde live performance that’s both awe-inspiring and slightly alienating. There’s real power in Heathe’s ability to evoke that feeling, but as a piece of recorded music, it leaves me wanting just a little more.

Control Your Soul’s Desire For Freedom is a difficult album for me to pin down. As a fan of the autre and experimental, I’ve endured more than my fair share of tuneless dirges masquerading as clever, and Heathe are not guilty of that. Beyond offering genuinely novel and distinctive sounds, there’s a powerful emotional core to this album that I deeply respect, but not one I’m keen to repeatedly partake in. Heathe are a band I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on, and I’d love to experience their brand of sonic alienation in a live setting. For now, though, they fall short of delivering an album that feels truly essential.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Empty Tape / Virkelighedsfjern
Websites: hethe.bandcamp.com|facebook.com/heathedeath
Releases Worldwide: October 3rd, 2025

#25 #2025 #ControlYourSoulSDesireForFreedom #Denmark #Drone #EmptyTape #Experimental #FreeJazz #Heathe #Industrial #MassiveAttack #Noise #NuMetal #Oct25 #PostHardcore #Review #Reviews #Swans #TheBody #Virkelighedsfjern

Quinn Shephard Sets Cast For Netflix Drama Series ‘The Body’
#Casting #Netflix #QuinnShephard #TheBody

https://deadline.com/2025/10/the-body-cast-quinn-shephard-netflix-series-unveiled-1236568511/

Netflix Sets Cast for Coming of Age Drama Series ‘The Body’
#Variety #News #GabbyWindey #Netflix #TheBody

https://variety.com/2025/tv/news/netflix-the-body-cast-gabby-windey-1236537894/

Quando Pascoli scrisse "X Agosto" aveva quest'album come sottofondo

https://the-body.bandcamp.com/album/i-shall-die-here

#TheBody #IShallDieHere #Music #Musica #Metal #DroneMetal

Today calls for noise. Sweet, beautiful noise. https://thebody.bandcamp.com/album/all-the-waters-of-the-earth-turn-to-blood #TheBody

Netflix Adapting S.A. Cosby’s ‘All The Sinners Bleed’ For TV, Orders Quinn Shephard Drama ‘The Body’
#News #AlltheSinnersBleed #JoeRobertCole #Netflix #QuinnShephard #TheBody

https://deadline.com/2025/05/netflix-all-the-sinners-bleed-quinn-shephard-the-body-1236397668/

Sleep rewires the brain to strengthen memories https://www.earth.com/news/sleep-rewires-the-brain-to-strengthen-memories/

"Why is a good night’s sleep so crucial for a sharp memory? A team of neuroscientists has taken a major step toward answering this question."

#theMind #theBody

Exercise Boosts Memory Across All Ages - Neuroscience News https://neurosciencenews.com/exercise-memory-aging-28512/

"Yoga, Tai Chi, and exergames showed the strongest improvements in memory and cognition."

#theMind #theBody

THE BODY (Estats Units) presenta nova col·laboració: "Was I Good Enough?" #TheBody #ExperimentalSludge #DoomMetal #Noise #Industrial #Març2025 #EstatsUnits #NovaCol·laboració #Metall #Metal #MúsicaMetal #MetalMusic

I appropriately saved this #NewMusic album for the #Bundestagwahl2025 today, because I am fearing the worst outcome. 😬

#DoomMetal singer #DisFig from #Berlin, #Germany collaborated with #noise #industrial #ElectronicMusic duo #TheBody from #Portland, #Oregan for this apocalyptic #artwork.

Dis Fig & The Body performed their wall of sound in the #Audiotree🌲 studio live, an amazing platform for worldwide music discovery, I wish Audiotree was here on :mastodon: Mastodon. 🙏
https://disfig.bandcamp.com/album/orchards-of-a-futile-heaven/

For people who enjoyed The Crying Out of Things from the body last year, they have a new album out soon with intensive Care. I don't know anything about intensive Care, but the single on the Bandcamp pre-order page is promising.

Was I Good Enough? from the body, intensive Care - out 14 March.

https://thebody.bandcamp.com/album/was-i-good-enough

#TheBody #IntensiveCare #ExperimetalMetal
Cc @SteveClough

as the new year approaches, instead of looking ahead in hopes of living a more wishful future, take a moment to look back and reflect on what you have done this past year to make life better for others; adjust your plans accordingly.

#theMind #theBody #theFuture

The neuroscience of placebo analgesia: Brain pathway explains how expectations reduce pain

https://www.psypost.org/the-neuroscience-of-placebo-analgesia-brain-pathway-explains-how-expectations-reduce-pain/

"Placebo analgesia reveals the human brain’s natural ability to modulate pain. For pain physicians and scientists, harnessing this inherent power for pain management is a compelling goal" -- #EricWDolan

#theMind #theBody #pain

"The follies of youth become the vices of adulthood and the disgrace of old age." -- Anonymous

#theMind #theBody

If you like your metal experimental, this is a treat: The Crying Out of Things from the body.

I'm not good on my sub-genres, but this has so many elements in the mix - industrial, horns, drum beats and discordant noise over downbeat drone and doom.

(Thanks to @SteveClough for recommending it as penance for unspecified misdeeds.)

#NowListening #TheBody #metal

https://thebody.bandcamp.com/album/the-crying-out-of-things

A little nihilistic for a Friday, but I'm absolutely here for it. #TheBody #ExperimentalMetal https://thebody.bandcamp.com/album/the-crying-out-of-things

Helemaal fantastisch waren #TheBody & #DisFig. De laatste niet te verwarren met #Fizzgig en de eerste niet met #FransTimmermans in een oude hoodie achter een tafeltje met electronica, af en toe in de microfoon gillend als een #Nazgûl. Live erg goed.

https://youtu.be/wVL1QNa8BfI

#LeGuessWho

4 stories that were good. I enjoyed 3 of them. Apt Pupil is not so much something one enjoys, but rather uses to inoculate oneself from ignorance that evil exists. Shawshank was addicting. The Body had characters you care about, even tho they toss off slurs. The Breathing Method is short and a bit oblong. But once it gets to Xmas, the story sinks its teeth.

I think i recom...

https://bookwyrm.social/user/Scofisticated/review/5684186/s/difficult-but-well-done#anchor-5684186
#Bookstodon @bookstodon #Books #StephenKing #Shawshank #TheBody #AptPupil #TheBreathingMethod

Scientists discover sleep “reset” mechanism in the brain that prevents memory overload

https://www.psypost.org/scientists-discover-sleep-reset-mechanism-in-the-brain-that-prevents-memory-overload/

"The research team studied the brain activity of mice to better understand how the hippocampus balances memory storage during sleep." -- #EricWDolan

#theMind #theBody #sleep #memory

🔊 #NowPlaying on #KEXP's #SonicReducer

The Body:
🎵 J.W.C.

#TheBody

https://theveraproject.bandcamp.com/track/j-w-c

#TheMetalDogArticleList
#MetalInjection
THE BODY's New Single "End Of Line" Will Destroy Your Speakers

https://metalinjection.net/new-music/the-bodys-new-single-end-of-line-will-destroy-your-speakers

#THEBODY #EndOfLine

🔊 #NowPlaying on #BBC6Music's #FreakZonePlaylist

The Body & Dis Fig:
🎵 To Walk a Higher Path

#TheBody #DisFig

https://disfig.bandcamp.com/track/to-walk-a-higher-path

https://open.spotify.com/track/68znSlUEWoyQUzS4D46Y8n