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- Summary: Classical-minimalist composer Ben Frost makes eerie, ambient-electronic noise in By the Throat.
- Record Label: Bedroom Community
- Genre(s): Electronic
- More Details and Credits »
Score distribution:
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Positive: 7 out of 7
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Mixed: 0 out of 7
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Negative: 0 out of 7
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By the Throat demands those kinds of complex distinctions, though. Its radiance is a dark one, and its most sinister moments lead to deliberate calm.
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The result is easily one of the more intriguing and overlooked releases of 2009, and an infinitely disturbing meld of visceral semblance and quiet complexity.
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It’s a hollow, unforgiving, brutal yet utterly beautiful record, full of deep intricacies that won’t let you go. ‘By The Throat’ indeed.
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In the midst of the beautiful descending piano chords of the Twin Peaks referencing ‘Leo Needs a New Pair of Shoes’ a blade of static erupts without warning, coming to life with an extremely high-frequency version of a distress flare’s hiss. Once this has faded the track’s coda becomes the most beautiful section of the album, clean descending string-playing blending with a more frenetic bowing and echoing wolf cries.
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The melding of clinical technology and human elements -- i.e., real instruments -- as a way of bringing the listener in made it nearly unbearable, but so utterly original that it compelled one to engage it.
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It’s not only an addition to 2009’s unassailably fantastic class of ambient music, but in a way is unique to that class for the menace with which it’s threaded.
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Certainly, this won’t be everyone’s cup of tea. But for those looking for mystical sources of inspiration, or an unsettling soundtrack, then By the Throat might be just the trick.
Score distribution:
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Positive: 1 out of 1
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Mixed: 0 out of 1
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Negative: 0 out of 1
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Dec 6, 2017
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