886VG begins the disc with 3 short tracks (at least compared to the other artists’ contributions), which left me completely fucking floored! 886VG, the project of Ignacio Ruz from Chile, runs through 3 tracks of dizzying harsh noise with plenty of cut-up dynamics. Think lots of fast changes, abrupt stops, hard-panned channels, stuttering bits, tones that alternate between low end crumble to high end shriek, obscured vocals, static wash, and countless other noisy permutations all unfolding at breakneck speeds. His tracks are every bit as good as some of the big names toiling in harsh cut-up noise. I have to admit, I was half expecting his pieces to be pedestrian wall tracks or lackluster harsh noise improvisations. I couldn’t have been more wrong. These pieces are crafted with power, precision, and focus. To be honest, I would’ve been a happy camper to have ended things with his 3 tracks, as 886VG certainly raised a very high bar to start things off with.

Up next we have a meaty track by Carrion Black Pit. Carrion Black Pit is a personal favorite of mine, where Elias C., of Sleep of Ages fame, shows his HNW side. CBP’s track entitled “Death Rattle Orchestra,” is a strange one for this project. 6 minutes in and I was beginning to wonder if Elias had switched gears and abandoned focusing on walls with this project. The piece begins with a low end, buoyant bass line. A wallish element creeps in….broken static that sounds like a tin roof being pelted in a heavy rainstorm. I actually quite liked this part, but then it abruptly moves into a sort of tribal direction, until those sounds are again abruptly broken up by the proper wall. Once the walls sets in, we’re immersed in 10 minutes or so of low-end bass juddering (which sounds like a rapidly pounding bongo drum) and crispy static crackle. It’s competent wall-riding for sure, but then we take another abrupt diversion around 17 minutes in. The wall is disrupted by what sounds like the high-pitched, squeaky friction of metal parts being rubbed together. It was a bit off-putting, not being a sound profile I tend to like. This continues to the tracks end, sans a final few seconds of noisy scumbling at the track’s closure. There are certainly parts of this track I like and some I could live without. It’s a weird track by a project I usually find to be spot on. I admire the attempt at moving beyond pure wall, but I’m nevertheless kind of left undecided about this piece.

Next we have a long 16+ minute wall by Zero Gravity Funeral. It’s a fairly pedestrian affair of low-end atmospheric density and blustering, static fuzz. It’s a solid block of static noise through its duration. It’s not necessarily a failed slice of wall-riding, but there’s nothing really remarkable about it either. Overall it sounds somewhat compressed, undercutting the wall’s power. It’s always a bad sign when 3 minutes into a wall I’m already looking at my watch wondering how much longer I have to endure this. For me a wall is all about immersion, but I need a sound or texture I can really sink my teeth into to make me want to dig in and take that ride. Unfortunately, this untitled piece didn’t really have any particular sounds I cared to latch onto for any extended period of time. Ultimately, it’s just falls really flat.

Finally, we have an extended track by Nitts. I don’t know anything about this project and don’t know that I really like this track all that much, but the previous track was so lackluster that I at least took notice. This untitled track is one long, sprawling piece of harsh noise improvisation. Ordinally that is something I usually dig, but it has to have an interesting enough pallete of sounds to draw from. Nitts hits the mark for me….half of the time. Overall you get lots of hissy, atmospheric noise blasts, wavering static wash, and what sounds like a whole lot of contact mic and pedal masterbation. There’s lots of peaks and valleys and Nitts does a good enough job of keeping the pace moving and pulls out enough tricks to keep things interesting. My only quibble is the length. For what it is, the length is a bit much for me to digest. If this piece was say 5-10 minutes, I’d probably be in love. But it’s 22 minutes in length, which just seems like overkill. Sometimes less is more.

All in all, I’ll say this 4-way split is a mixed bag. 886VG is fucking phenomenal! Carrion Black Pit and (to a lesser extent) Nitts presented mixed, though mostly good efforts and Zero Gravity Funeral was forgettable. I guess the best I can say about this album is that it’s a good sampling of 4 (presumably) active noisers on one economical, handy dandy CD-R. While I didn’t particularly like everything, I will say that you’re bound to find something you like on here. It did introduce me to 886VG, which I plan to investigate further. So thanks for that No Brain Productions!