Genre: Noise / Experimental / Dark Ambient

01 Kryskraft
02 Things Happen To People Who Drink Fiasco
03 The End Of Your Empire
04 White Wine
05 Bergkamp Theme
06 Act
07 Graeme Revelle’s Velvet Dream
08 Non Adequate
09 Core 3
10 Beyond
11 Deaf Day
12 Hands In Smooth Palate
13 Alcoworld

The minds behind this project, Andrei Blokhin, Igor Mukhin, and Mamikon Vartapetyan, have been working together under different guises since 1998 but this self titled release collating the best of their works from 2004 and 2005, is their official debut.

On offer here then, are thirteen tracks of experimental industrial music, interspersed with sonic structures and sheets of noise. A quick preview of the tracks promises great things, time for a thorough investigation.

‘Kryskraft’ starts off with the sound of desolation, electronic wind blowing through deserted warehouses, moaning and whistling its way past lumped machinery, a blast of scrap metal percussion cuts through the gloom and something stirs in the shadows. Highly evocative and incredibly atmospheric, things are off to a good start.

‘Kryskraft’ flows into ‘Things Happen To People Who Drink Fiasco’ which continues in the same vein. Gradually increasing in intensity and adding swirling vocals and spiky electronics, building a mournful atmosphere before cutting abruptly into ‘White Wine’ which is a far busier affair. Static overlays droning bass, skittering around as it does, a near euphoric chord is brutally disassembled and twisted into new shapes. The entire effect totally lays waste to the atmosphere carefully built beforehand, but it’s not a bad thing and is done gracefully enough not to affect the listening experience.

Following on, ‘The End Of Your Empire’ is a darker beast, a spray of static pervades throughout and the addition of a huge bass sweep adds to a feeling of barely restrained power. Although still in the Dark Ambient arena, this track has less organic feel than those before, soft edges are mostly absent and a harsher feel is starting to come to light. With ‘Bergkamp Theme’ the transition is almost complete. Chains rattling, metal implements clattering into each other and the distant sounds of metal on metal railings give this a real feel of an industrial complex, working efficiently at first yet slowly decaying into mist as time passes.

The remainder of this release treads the same pathway, through industrial landscapes haunted by walls of outlandish sound, populated by sparse sonic constructions. Deeper and less abrasive than I initially suspected but no less worthy as a result. On first listening I would have described Lebenswelt’s style as similar to Daniel Menche, but closer inspection has shown this to be wide of the mark, a comparison that doesn’t do Lebenswelt true justice. Theirs is a cleaner, more defined sound, sparse in comparison to Menche’s sonic overload, but equally inventive and innovative, compositions rather than constructions. Indeed, some parts of this album are almost breathtakingly orchestral in size, scope and emotional impact.

As a debut release this is a fine offering, from its darkest moments of distorted mania to the euphoric orchestral highs and everywhere in between it sparks with ideas and fires the imagination. Darkness and light, beauty and menace, rendered in sound against a backdrop of industrial decay. A damn fine release and a promise of many good things yet to come.