insomnia poisoning thy self (cdr from mandarangan recordings)
this release really seems like it would be better suited to cassette. maybe i'm just having a fit of cassette nostalgia, but it seems like the lo-fi sound is more appropriate to audio tape. this sounds like it was played though a really thin apartment wall; you can hear everything perfectly but doesn't have the piercing brightness that it would have had if it was happening right in front of you. soundwise this is pretty busy: screams, samples, thrash guitar and noise all types. it's hard to tell which vocals are sampled and which are original to the recording sometimes, the sixth track 'nuclear fantasy' has some singing that wouldn't sound out of place on an early (kooler than jesus era) my life with the thrill kill kult cd, and there's a lot of screaming on various tracks. sounds are layered over each other and juxtaposed in interesting ways, such as the brief bird chirps over the already layered noise of 'immigration'. i didn't really know anything about insomnia when i ordered this other than it was his first release, and i can say i've never been really disappointed with a person's first experiments with noise. they always seem to be crazier and more innovative than later works and poisoning thy self is no exception. standout tracks: 'suffocate' (for it's crazy sped up langoliers sample), 'immigration' and 'message in a ballet'.