It's hard to imagine that Japan's two premiere noisemakers - Keiji Haino and Masami Akita, aka Merzbow - going soft with age. But it's also hard to imagine anyone keeping up the sheer brutality of their early work for three decades. The two each began their recording careers in the early 1980s, Haino (born in 1952) with intense attacks of electric guitar and screaming, and Akita (1956) using tape loops, metal and percussion. Individually and avowedly, each pursued dark realms of their own devise, combining frightening aural imagery with strange serenities.
But recent years have found each of the artists exploring new ground. Haino has released beautifully quiet albums recorded on acoustic instruments and Akita's work has grown more structured - and seemingly more sentimental - since he began playing laptop. But to say they've gone soft with age, of course, must be taken in context. There's nothing soft about Pulzerized Purple, their first duo album, at least by any conventional standards. Recorded live at the 2007 FIMAV festival in Victoriaville, Quebec, the five tracks (ranging from 6 minutes to half an hour) take feedback, overdrive and ambient grind as their base. But there's a wide variety of sounds atop. Each plays drum kit at various points, as well as plenty of electronic effects, but Haino's acoustic strings and angelic voice provide some abstract beauty. Those moments can seem incongruous, even jarring, and in fact the best moments come in the title track, which comprises close to half the disc. Here they do what they do best - Haino's guitar screaming with slow, clean, bluesy lines and then dissolving into Akita's waves of aural energy. It was an inspired booking for the festival, and the recording stands as a worthy addition to each of their discographies.
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