Stallagh - Nihilistik Terrror
Autopsy Kitchen Records
Black Noise
3 songs (73'54")
Release year: 2006
Autopsy Kitchen Records
Reviewed by Alex

I knew this one is not going to be easy and this review will read more like an essay or an editorial. When I heard of the premise under which Stalaggh creates their music I was intrigued. Incognito members of Dutch and Belgian black and industrial metal scene join forces to picture the most primal and misanthropic emotions - fear, hatred, depression, hopelessness. But to make it REAL they use mental patients to do the vocal parts. Is this cruel? Is this an exploitation to use troubled, damaged brain to squeeze it even further, to crawl inside its crevices, to expose its emotions? The last thing I want to be is a judge, but the individual involved in the recording of Projekt Nihil is rumored to have committed suicide since. This, perhaps, is totally unrelated to his participation in Stalaggh, but it is an evidence of the disturbed state of mind that person was in.

Nihilistik Terrror is a remix of two sparsely available Stalaggh opuses, Projekt Nihil and Project Terrror, along with another untitled track. You can hardly call these Projekts tracks, songs, or music in the sense I believe the word was invented to portray. Stalaggh is rather an oppressive wall of monstrous black noise, a combination of electrostatic hiss, fuzz and crackling, unheard of distortion in electronics, amplified droning stupefying bass line, sounds of endless shards of falling glass and nails scratching metal. Within all this dissonance and disharmony we have vocal lines, but never words or defined human sounds. Instead, these are body and soul tearing screams, hisses, moans, gurgling and hysterical screams. Projekt Nihil seems to have a solo individual, while Terrror has different voices joining this terrible concoction.

Two minutes in I could have popped Nihilistik Terrror out, having realized what I am about to witness. However, I promised myself I would sit through these 73 min at least once, trying as I might to strain my feeble non-elitist mind, so it can understand why this has been created. After all, I expected to hear the unorthodox, I knew this would not be simple, I asked for this myself. Letting go and becoming desensitized, I was able to understand some points of this catharsis. If Nihil in the end provides for some inner peace, its descent in a way being the patient’s ascent, Terrror is pure torture. Some high-pitch sounds tend to hurt, but isn’t listening to Stalaggh supposed to be a sadomasochistic experience altogether? The untitled track ends so abruptly, so unexpectedly – the universe must have ceased to exist in an instant.

Speaking of audio torment and pain, Stalaggh is it, this can’t be topped. Having listened to it on my way to work and back I felt sick the rest of the day. If Terrror was recorded by herding a few of those unfortunates into a dark room, how would I feel if one of those souls was mine?

We were talking about giving quotes all week at MetalReviews, so I have to give one here. It is not based on the “quality” of music. There is no music here, and “quality” term does not apply. I have no idea how difficult it is to create this black noise, or remix it. My quote is not based on the ability to channel and express the emotions, I think Stalaggh succeeds at that, perhaps too much, and that is exactly what makes these Projekts so revolting and repulsive. My quote is based on my desire to hear this again. Would I want to? Never, never in a million years. Consider me non-elitist.

Killing Songs :
Hearing this kills the desire to listen to anything ever again for a long time
Alex quoted 10 / 100
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