For the nearly two decades now, infamous anti-music unit Penis Geyser have made it their sworn duty to reduce the already mangled corpse of shitcore to some elusive, accursed base state. Across a smattering of tapes, splits, and live shows that range from manic bursts of semi-rehearsed noisegrind to borderline performance art, the trio (a.k.a. Chad) have set a high standard for sonic desecration. Their new self-titled cassette on the venerable Gracious Host label is both a culmination of all that unholy work and a great entry point for any new converts, willing or unwilling. Clocking in at around twelve minutes, it’s one of the longest things they’ve released, probably cobbled together from scattered sessions and sets over the years. The result is a patchwork of hazardous ideas, rancid chunks at different stages of decomposition Frankensteined together. It documents some of the band’s most abstracted material yet, with many of the tracks dwelling in the negative space between one bleurgh and the next (which may or may not come). This downtime is familiar to anyone who’s attended a PG gig—there are usually drum pieces to retrieve from somewhere in the crowd, after all—but here it’s a full trough of its own, rich with feedback and squeaking kit hardware and noodle notes. Much like Juntaro’s iconic ONETWOTHREEFOURs, the stick count-ins become near-meaningless intrusions into whatever is already happening of its own accord. The all-out blasts are rare and all the more cathartic for it. I’ve found myself reaching for this tape over and over these past few weeks, finding some new detail in the rotten muck each time. Czerkies killed it with the layout as always. Unmissable.
Noise Not Music 