Bocksholm - Caged Inside The Beast Of The Forge

When two men meet for a couple of drinks, it can end in any possible way. When two men from Sweden meet for drinks, you can be almost sure that the result will be making music together. But when two guys with the names Peter Andersson and ... Peter Andersson decide to drink together few liters of moonshine, the result will always receive the form of Bocksholm! It is really amazing that two people with the same name from the same area prosper on the same fertile soil of post-industrial music. And I think it is completely natural that they should meet from time to time in order to share their personal visions for one poisonous mix of collective imagination and take it beyond their regular main projects Raison D'Etre and Deutsch Nepal.

Yes, if you had been missing the drunken products of this special duo, it is the right time to wear your helmet; this album is going to knock you down with a full power of heavy rail. I am sure that their sessions usually take place in a garage or a basement of one of them where the album 'Caged Inside the Beast of the Forge" could receive a massive injection of pure inspiration from surrounding hand tools and metal junk.

The record starts with "The Phantomghost", a kind of a slow intro track, where a deep droning hum becomes saturated with metallic ticks and cracking of atmospheric disturbances. Following "Bogamord" reveals all the beauty of heavy machinery, working engine of power generator fills the air with a dirty background color, creating groundwork for the constantly increasing structure of hitting hammers, sounds of drilling and cutting hand tools. "Koeven" is a slower composition with a slight ritualistic touch and a rhythm applied by an empty gasoline tank as a drum together with a creepy circling and pulsating sound that floats all around the space. The fourth composition "Mobil Oil" raises the level of noise again showing all full power of mechanical heart. A dense cacophony of working mechanisms and scratching metal parts embrace in an artificial rapture transferred directly into the following "Jerndod", which is similar by its spirit to the previous tracks.

In "Bi-Rath, The Beast of the Forge" the Sweden duo takes one more step forward. Music transforms to be even more violent and close to power electronics genre, full of overloaded frequencies and constant heavy scratching, being also the one and only track in this album where you can hear the voice of Lina Baby Doll singing some drunken stuff.

And here comes my favorite from this CD, the seventh composition "Forging Hammers" becomes a hymn for industrialization, concentrated around the rhythm of hammers, some drilling machine raising and falling noise, a dense background atmosphere guides the whole track, when the whole structure declares a triumph of machines over mankind.

Two tracks that close the album are kept in a quieter vein though dirty grey colors are still there together with the same flavors of rusty metals and hand tools.

With 'Caged Inside the Beast of the Forge' Lina Baby Doll and Peter Anderson spit into the face of modern co-called "industrial" music, showing the roots of the true genre based on analog instruments and sound experimentation, while the digital world turned music creation process into something bleak with a taste of mass production. People forget about creativity and imagination that should support the process and it is great to see some activity from bands like Bocksholm from time to time. Even if their material is not always brilliant, at least it is made with passion. Mar 12 2013