Beyond Sensory Experience - Pursuit of Pleasure
Hmmm....where to begin. Beyond Sensory Experience is the combined effort of Drakhon (MZ.412, Nordvargr/Drakh, L/A/B) and scientist/artist, K. Meizter. I can't say that I know much of anything about their previous three releases. This album is a part of a trilogy...although the bio on them doesn't really say which album in the trilogy this is. I do know that this is their first release on Cold Meat Industry.
Musically, this band is fabulous. They mainly stay in the realm of dark ambient and the feel thoughout is very gloomy, ala Raison d'Etre. Fans of Raison will definitely feel at home here. At times you will hear sweeping and droning sounds mixed with industrial noises, sometimes a lone, haunting piano, sometimes rushing/bubbling water, and lots of spoken samples. Many of the samples you can understand, but many of them are drowned out my the music. The music is calming and simple, yet very moving.
Now comes the negative part of the album. The "theme" behind this album seems to be on human sexuality for the most part. If song titles like "Pursuit of Pleasure", "Code of Sexual Morality", "The Lickerish Quartet", and "Advanced Human Sexuality" didn't give it away, then the artwork in the CD booklet would. The CD booklet throughout is filled with sexual pictures, including a great deal of nudity (although many of the pictures are somewhat hidden in pictures of towns, roads, and nature). Then, many of the songs themselves are filled with sounds of female sexual moaning and heavy breathing. There are also many sound samples that discuss human sexuality and related topics. Truthfully, I can really do without this kind of stuff in my music. I'd be VERY interested in this band on a release dealing with something other than sex, but most of the stuff here is quite distasteful. Many people get a kick out of this, but I am quite disgusted really.
I think that this band is very talented and one that I would rank right up there with some of the better dark ambient acts. They just need to find some different subject matter to theme their albums around.
Please note - My rating is based on an average of the music and the subject matter of the disc. The overall rating would be much higher if the band were judged on music only.
Rating: 65/100
Review By: Matt Morrow
Label: Cold Meat Industry
Total Songs: 10
Total Time: 56:51
Tracklisting: 1. Pursuit of Pleasure, 2. Affection/Devotion, 3. Anything Golden, 4. Code of Sexual Morality, 5. The Trade, 6. Youth Duality, 7. The Lickerish Quartet, 8. Advanced Human Sexuality (AHS), 9. Craving the Touch, 10. Hold Your Breath and Close Your Eyes.
Best Songs: Tracks 3 and 9.
Band Lineup: Drakhon and K. Meizter
Band Website: http://www.bse.se